Fat Bloke on a Bike

Good morning This is the second of probably 6 videos of my cycling in New Zealand this year.  This episode sees me visit the Blue Spring and move into the mountains of North Island.  It's getting remote! No music in this one as I would like you to join me on the journey.  I'm full of comments about the good and the bad etc and a couple of discussions with really nice folk.  More of that to follow in later videos too.  You never know.  Based on my honest telling of how it was, well, you just might fancy having a crack at it yourself one day ?  Episode 3 should be out in a couple more weeks.. Ciao for now.. 

  Good morning I’m in the process of building a sequence of videos that encompass my experience riding in New Zealand this year.  This is episode 1 which covers the prep the fly out and days 1 to 3.  There will probably be 6 or so episodes in total.  I produce this stuff really for me. To aid my future memories. I am not really a ‘YouTuber’ nor an influencer. Nonetheless it is nice to read comments if any are left. Some duplication from shorter previous videos perhaps but this is the collection of it all into the final story. Warts n all.  So sharing with y’all. Family and friends. 😊 Well, I like the process of making them. Hope you enjoy joining me on the journey.  Episode 2 - the timber trail - will perhaps be completed in the next 2 weeks 👍🏻 Ciao for now

Suddenly, I'm awake.  I see nothing in the blackness.  I immediately start to panic for I am totally, totally lost.  Where the feck am I?   To suddenly wake into the pitch black not knowing where one is, well it's one of the scariest experiences ever.  As though stuck at the end of a dream reel unable to get out of the darkened cinema.  Not a clue where any light switch may be.  Fearful of moving in case something awful were to happen.  Think man, THINK!  I'm still hours away from dawn yet it slowly dawns on me that I am, yes, I must be back home.    The dim light normally projected by the clock's LED light is missing cos all that was normally powered on had been shut off the day I left home.  In the dreadful tiredness of my arrival all I could do was fight the desperate fight for sleep to give me some chance, any chance of putting my body clock again on it's head in order to get in-sync with UK time.   I struggle recallin...

Well, that’s it folks. Today I arrived into a gloriously sunny Christchurch. On the scale of - which big New Zealand city would you like to spend the most time in?    Well of the 3 - Christchurch is number 1 by miles.  Today was a nice easy 18 mile cruise into town. On the flat. Racing skinny old racing snakes on their blunt razors. And beating them!    You know what is going through his head. WTF!    A fat man on a fully loaded tour bike and I can’t keep up with him! I tell him about my journey.  …I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack e-bikes on fire off the shoulder of an upside down Orion. I watched mosquitos glitter in the dark near the Timber Trail Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like [I cough one last time] tears in rain. Time to die…. It might have felt like it on a number of occasions but NO THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO DIE!    Memories. So so important to us all. It is why I write this BLOG and video my r...

The blasted Crap nav is doing its best to give me the full New Zealand experience and being that I am easily lead I continue to do as I’m told.  I seem to be fighting everything. The crap nav for sure. There really is only one route down to Christchurch which means I have been stuck on national route 1 for the last 3 days. Not too bad really cos the traffic was relatively light and there was a decent shoulder for the best part of it. However it is the only route connecting the South Island to the North Island so it kinda has all the traffic and big rigs from the ferry, the farms the loggjng etc on it...   So the crap nav says let’s go this way and I say okay 🤨. After hours of greasing along on lovely tarmac I suddenly find myself courtesy of the Crap Nav back on an ultra-ultra soft gravelly road. When will I ever learn!    I for sure plough through it better than cycling it. And then there’s the fence. We climb over that. And then the river bed. We fight throug...

Let me tell you that there is NOTHING, NOTHING better than a hot shower after a hot sweaty sunny day riding a tour bike.  Especially here in New Zealand. The water pressure is off the scale. I mean if you’ve ever been in a cheapo bed and breakfast in the UK with their little 4.5kw shower which when you give it the beans with the hot switch produces a trickle out of its shower head?    It runs like an old man with a prostrate problem. And you’re in a 2ft square mouldy jelly mould in a cold damp room going by how the walls and manky curtain stick to your cold body. As hard as you try you’re never gonna get the soap out of your - well everywhere!.  Nah here in this country every damn place is plugged into some ultra high pressure source. By God do you need to be careful with the taps save evicerating yourselves. But the showers!  Oh boy oh boy oh boy!  Once you’ve finished twiddling with her buttons she gives you a tingly sensation all over better than having ...