"Young people today, put 'em in the army, that'll sort 'em out!" Well, recently my nephew decided to put himself in the Army, successfully completed his recruit training and is now a trooper in the Queen Alexandra's Mounted Rifles Regiment (he was pretty well sorted anyway if you ask me.) The family went down to Waiouru for his graduation parade so I decided to take the bike. It was a two day trip, the first from Auckland to Ohakune, the second Ohakune to Waiouru for the parade, then Waiouru back ...
Not having anything planned for Queen's Birthday weekend I decided to go back to East Cape and finish what I started last month - this time head from Opotiki to Gisborne through the Waioeka gorge, then up the coast to Te Araroa and back around to Opotiki via the road already travelled - not sure why but I wanted to complete the East Cape 'loop' . The gorge was probably the main reason. When I was a kid I used to tag along with my Dad in the school holidays as he drove all over the ...
So I ended up going on a very different trip for my second go at camping (which makes me an expert now). Instead of going on my own this time I got to travel in the company of Bosslady, who had decided she wanted to have a go at camping also. Turns out there wasn't much camping after all - you can read her blog if you want to find out the details of the trip, and her experience of it, but I thought I would chime in with a short note on how it was for me. Ashamed as ...
So last weekend I decided to supplement my reading about other people's motorcycle touring trips and have a go at a short trip of my own. I've always liked the 'idea' of camping, and managed to buy a tent and self inflating mattress on special on Saturday, took a look at the map and decided it was a relatively straight run to Napier from Auckland. Wasn't sure I was actually going until Sunday morning when I headed south with a minimum of planning. Here's some observations ...