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Gremlin's Tall Stories

Learner Friendly Ride to Cape Reinga Part 2 (20/11/2011)

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Sunday morning, and it appears no-one is being suicidal, and the alarm rings me instead, at 7.30am. Time for another… interesting… shower. Perhaps the only downside of the weekend, as it’s rather annoying, but it was the last shower anyway. Down for another breakfast and instead of making the same mistake again, I had the bacon first in a bacon sandwich, then I had some cereal and topped it off with peaches in juice. Oh… and a sausage, because it said it didn’t like its friends.

I pulled the BMW out of the covered area as the next maintenance job was checking the tyre pressures, once again, last checked before leaving for Wellington. Sure enough, after that many kilometres the tyres were each a couple of PSI low, so pulled out the air compressor and pumped up the tyres. Of course, most bikes don’t have this capability, and the learners were rather surprised, so some more questions and several bikes also had their pressures checked.

Everyone finished packing and geared up. People formed up in their groups and left group by group. I took TEC again and only got to the outskirts of Coopers Beach before realising that specially setting my toiletries aside had meant I had probably forgotten them. I didn’t bother stopping to check, and turned around straight away, passing the rather surprised looking Holden support car in the side streets.

Back to the lodge, Newbi was still there packing and rather surprised to see me, as were the hosts, but they suspected immediately I’d forgotten something. Toiletries right where I left them, now I had the arduous task of catching back up. The road was reasonably clear of traffic so it took about 40km to be back on the tail of the group, catching up just after Kaeo. We re-grouped at the Kerikeri roundabout, and Maha declared a slight change in format.

He wasn’t entirely certain of the route ahead, but we’d be travelling as one group instead of the 3 separate groups previously used. I had a look at the route ahead, which seemed reasonably straight forward, and with extra experienced riders on hand, we could have a leader, TEC and some markers. LankyBastard, Grant and I would be the markers to keep the group on track to Kaikohe for the next stop.

I led off down the road with Grant and LankyBastard behind, enjoying a brief change in pace, before my typical adventures returned to almost send the ride off track. According to the map, the first turn to the left was just that, a left turn. As planned, I marked it, except it was a marked bend and not a turn. It started to unravel quickly after that. I waited for the group to pass then figured it was best to be at the front to try and sort out the mess the riders were heading into.

Down the first straight I overtook some of the group, and Grant had taken the next turn as planned, another left but it should have actually been me, as that looked like a bend, but it was actually a turn (see how it’s all going wrong?). It was amusing to see Grant step right out of the road he was previously standing in, when he saw me charging into the corner after an overtake and reckoned I was going too quick. A slight lock up which the ABS quickly sorted out and probably to Grant’s disappointment, my panniers didn’t even touch down. I completed overtaking the pack on Wehirua Rd (accidentally scaring a couple of learners when I wooshed past).

I found LankyBastard at the end of the road, slightly confused, as I remembered him learning the directions as Left-Left-Right, except at the end of Wehirua Rd a right would take you back north on SH1. If I’d marked correctly, it would have been the second left. Sigh…. Anyway, rides that go according to plan are boring, or at least that’s how I explain it away. I leave LankyBastard to mark that turn as the group starts filing past and head south to mark Te Pua Rd for the group. The directions are easy from there, so I form up at the rear of the group for the last handful of km to Kaikohe.

Pulling in to the Caltex I find a couple of guys helping blue rider who appears to have dropped her bike. I find Maha and he intends for us to head to the café down the road so I offer to find and mark it for everyone to arrive. This plan is scotched, as its clear blue rider’s bike needs some TLC and more importantly, zip ties to hold it together, as the rear brake pedal mount has snapped off. Subscribing to Toto’s religion of zip ties and tape, I carry such essentials so tell Maha I need to help blue rider instead, and Maha replies the café is closed anyway.

Jessica comes to the aid of the little Scorpio, with nzspokes doing the actual fitting of supplied zip ties and the mount will stay in place until Auckland, but the rear brake won’t be operational. With blue rider on her way I pack everything away and spying the other bikes down the road, I follow them. They pull over and say they are trying to find the MacDonald’s that Maha set as the stop, so trusty Karen comes to the rescue and I lead the last of the group down a side road. As nzspokes says later, I bet it’s the first time you’ve used a GPS to locate a MacDonald’s and he was actually correct.

After a break the road ahead was Twin Bridges, a road I hadn’t been down for years, so I set off first, to find Grant already at the intersection to the main road, so I marked the turn by the Shell station. I realised too late that I had no idea who the last bike was, so waited a while after LankyBastard passed through to be sure there were no remaining bikes.

Heading south to Twin Bridges there were a few bikes on the road, including some of the Ulysses, whom I recognised from the Grand Challenge and Capital Cruise. I caught up to LankyBastard a bit too soon, having a lot of fun on the initial corners, so settled into being TEC again. The next stop was the twin bridges themselves, no-one opting to use the old bridge. Just before, one of the guys from the car was lying in the bushes to take pictures, which caught me by surprise when LankyBastard suddenly held out his hand to the undergrowth.

Seeing the bridges around the corner, I turned around and pillioned him to the bridges, to save him the walk. We took a group photo on the bridge then carried on, with Phreak the last to leave, so I followed him to Maungatapere. We had another brief stop there, for those that wanted to refuel, but the last group fuelled up as we all left, so the last group was well behind the leaders on the run through to Waipu. On Otaika Valley Road we came across a cop out hunting, but the pace of learners was around 80-90kph so we were in no danger of an involuntary talk.

Richard on the cruiser got a little lost at the Marsden Point roundabout but LankyBastard set him straight and we were on our way to a delicious lunch at Waipu Pizza Barn. Maha had rung them in the morning and they had said they don’t reserve for groups under 20, fortunately there were 21 bikes and 3 in the car. The food came a whole lot faster than Houhora Tavern, mostly I would suspect because the Barn is busy most days, and as usual, was delicious. I had a small pizza, not feeling overly hungry, and then stole a couple of Maha’s chips. The weather had been terrific all day, still no sign of any clouds, hitting a high around 22 degrees.

LankyBastard and EnglishKiwi left us there, heading directly south, as they had other things to do, while the rest of us headed through Cove Rd, regrouping at Mangawhai. In hindsight (and as Maha said) it wasn’t the best choice, given the extensive road works, but from what I saw as TEC, the learners handled the gravel very well. A brief re-group at Mangawhai, and then south using the back roads that bypassed Wellsford and brought us out on SH1 just north of Dome Valley.

Maha had mentioned they would be splitting off at Warkworth, and I expected the group would continue on, splitting off as required. We took a few unexpected turns, and perhaps even more unexpected for Maha and Mom, the entire group followed them home Everyone started de-gearing, so I thanked Maha and Mom and organised a small group of learners that wanted to leave immediately, as I had other things I needed to do, but was quite happy to accompany learners over the bridge if they needed it.

Richard on the cruiser left at Onewa, then the learners split off as we continued south, then I left Maakz to it, when I exited at Highbrook, arriving at Xtreme Indoor Karts at 5.15pm, 30 minutes early, but going home, de-gearing and coming back would have taken more than 30 minutes, so easier to simply head there direct.

My thanks to Maha and Mom for organising a great weekend, albeit it a bit shorter for me because of work on the Friday. Thanks to the leaders and TECs for keeping the learners safe, and also the learners, most important of all, as without them, there wouldn’t have been a need for the weekend. I hope lots was learnt, and all your questions were answered. Perhaps not the most useful answer, but an answer nonetheless.

After the third weekend of riding in four, Jessica now has 37,000km on the clock. Not long to go for another service, but no more big rides are planned until next year.

Pics of the weekend here: http://s210.photobucket.com/albums/b...Cape%20Reinga/

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Comments

  1. Grant`'s Avatar
    Yes you could say I was slightly disappointed to see all the wizardry come into play when you hit that corner. I was expecting sparks coming off multiple parts of your bike as your ground out pegs,cases, exhaust - hell even knee sliders if you had some on

    Let me know if your keen for a Waipoua forest/Mangamuka mission one weekend. quick pootle for you.
  2. Phreak's Avatar
    Lol I thought my 'wake-up' call was appreciated! Guess not, huh? Even though I was the last one to bed and among the first up that day, I figured everyone should be up as well... Hehe...
  3. blue rider's Avatar
    it was good meeting you and jessica "the bright one"
    i too will now carry zipties to everywhere I go
  4. Gremlin's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Grant`
    Yes you could say I was slightly disappointed to see all the wizardry come into play when you hit that corner. I was expecting sparks coming off multiple parts of your bike as your ground out pegs,cases, exhaust - hell even knee sliders if you had some on
    Hah, that's German engineering for ya! Despite her size, she's actually really good on the road. Still, load her up, and even adjusting the suspension, I do touch the side and centre stands on the ground... Will do re Waipoua Forest... haven't been that way since probably last year.
  5. Gremlin's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Phreak
    Lol I thought my 'wake-up' call was appreciated! Guess not, huh? Even though I was the last one to bed and among the first up that day, I figured everyone should be up as well... Hehe...
    No... appreciated it was not ... but you weren't in range either
  6. Gremlin's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by blue rider
    i too will now carry zipties to everywhere I go
    Yep, they are very handy. Tape as well, and tie downs can be used for multiple things in emergencies, including as a tow rope.
  7. The Singing Chef's Avatar
    Mind if I pop along for the Mangamuka ride

    Need a good blat to sort out my cornering issues after recent crash.

    Great write up Alan, (Allan?) Still got to do the video..
  8. Gremlin's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by The Singing Chef
    Mind if I pop along for the Mangamuka ride

    Need a good blat to sort out my cornering issues after recent crash.

    Great write up Alan, Still got to do the video..
    Hey cheffy, you know that a Mangamukas ride would be around 700km? Something like this: http://g.co/maps/mwnmm coz you have to do Opononi/Waipoua Forest as well.

    Yes... I was wondering where the video was...
  9. Maha's Avatar
    Awesome read Alan, you covered damn near everything. I don't think I saw this blog back in 2011. Someone had posted a memory on FB of this ride yesterday, yip five years ago this weekend just gone. I was just having a look through the thread and happened upon this...thankfully. Some funny moments in there. Cheers Mark.