varminter
11th February 2011, 14:40
Or East Cape as it is usually known as. For what seems like ages my wife and I had wanted to take a trip round the East Cape. The weekend just gone presented us with the opportunity given that I’ve just been made redundant, we’ve a bit of time on our hands (no money, just time) We set off on Sunday and headed to Gisbourne, apart from the heat it was a nice uneventful ride.
As we cleared the gorge and headed down to Ormond it began to heat up, after a while even with the jacket unzipped it felt like we were riding in an oven. The weather report said 32 degrees, I beg to differ. We booked into the motor camp, paid the extra for a unit with a heat pump, set it to 16 degrees and headed off to the beach…ahhhhh, bliss.
Next day we took off for Te Kaha, north of about Tokomaru Bay the wind picked up, by the time we passed Ruatoria it was blowing like a bastard. I reccon the worst was at Tikitiki it was so bad I almost gave up, it was like being clouted with a heavy pillow. We stopped at Te Araroa and eventually found the rest area, it was cleverly hidden under several feet of grass, and I’m certain the couple of people sitting outside the local shop were still in the same position I saw them in several years ago. The whole of the Cape road was singularly lacking in places to stop.
The ammount of road works was incredible, even past these we saw signs saying ‘bleeding tar’ I assume they didn’t have signs saying ‘fucking heaps of loose gravel’ I’m sure the Strom picked up several kilo’s of chips. Past Te Kaha there’s a bit of what was laughingly called ‘road’ that winds round with cliff on one side and ocean on the other, well not any more there’s not. The story is that after it fell into the sea it was re done, only to disappear again. Eventually someone decided to go inland, there is a detour for 2K’s at least 1K is tight 25K or less bends of loose gravel with lumps the size of a baby’s head, I was shitting myself. Loaded up with the wife and luggage, kitchen sink etc I was going so slow that snails were zipping past, couldn’t go faster, road too twisty and steep downhill, and me lacking in courage.
Stopped the night in Opotiki, came home Whakatane via coast road to Maketu and then home. I feel quite brave.
As we cleared the gorge and headed down to Ormond it began to heat up, after a while even with the jacket unzipped it felt like we were riding in an oven. The weather report said 32 degrees, I beg to differ. We booked into the motor camp, paid the extra for a unit with a heat pump, set it to 16 degrees and headed off to the beach…ahhhhh, bliss.
Next day we took off for Te Kaha, north of about Tokomaru Bay the wind picked up, by the time we passed Ruatoria it was blowing like a bastard. I reccon the worst was at Tikitiki it was so bad I almost gave up, it was like being clouted with a heavy pillow. We stopped at Te Araroa and eventually found the rest area, it was cleverly hidden under several feet of grass, and I’m certain the couple of people sitting outside the local shop were still in the same position I saw them in several years ago. The whole of the Cape road was singularly lacking in places to stop.
The ammount of road works was incredible, even past these we saw signs saying ‘bleeding tar’ I assume they didn’t have signs saying ‘fucking heaps of loose gravel’ I’m sure the Strom picked up several kilo’s of chips. Past Te Kaha there’s a bit of what was laughingly called ‘road’ that winds round with cliff on one side and ocean on the other, well not any more there’s not. The story is that after it fell into the sea it was re done, only to disappear again. Eventually someone decided to go inland, there is a detour for 2K’s at least 1K is tight 25K or less bends of loose gravel with lumps the size of a baby’s head, I was shitting myself. Loaded up with the wife and luggage, kitchen sink etc I was going so slow that snails were zipping past, couldn’t go faster, road too twisty and steep downhill, and me lacking in courage.
Stopped the night in Opotiki, came home Whakatane via coast road to Maketu and then home. I feel quite brave.