The frantic pace of the NZ segment of our tour caught up with me this morning. Motivating myself to get out of bed was harder than usual, even with two cups of coffee (thoughtfully provided by my considerate riding partner) under my belt. Just as we were discussing our breakfast options, our Arizonan-Iranian neighbor, Mike, came by and asked us if we wanted some cereal, thus saving us a stop and getting us on the road at the bright and early hour of 10:30. The first 20-odd kilometers of the day took us along more beautiful coastline, with more seals and huge colonies of sea birds.
Then the road turned abruptly inland and up into a serious of steep but beautiful passes. We panted and strained our way up a slope, only to drop down again and recommence climbing. On the plus side, the scenery here was stunning. Once we'd descended again, the ride became much easier, following river valleys past endless fields of sheep. Some of these beasts looked different from what we've grown accustomed to seeing. Having been freshly shorn, they had a pinkish hue, resembling baby mice. Passing one barn, I heard a telltale buzzing sound, and instructed Fred to stop. We thought we could sneak inside and get a photo or two of the sheep-shearing, but the gate to the farm was firmly closed.
The stop wasn't a total washout, however. As we sat waiting for shaved sheep (some of them with hockey-style haircuts resembling their shearers') to emerge from a hole in the barn and into a holding pen, Masa rode by. We'd met him on the boat from Wellington, a cute young Japanese from Kobe with an extremely limited vocabulary in English but a million-dollar smile. We invited him to ride with us the last hilly 10km to Cheviot, where we had a beer in the first bar we came across. The place was packed with oldsters, many of whom came up to talk to us.
One woman with a heavy Scottish brogue said she'd seen us from the bus earlier and was afraid we'd get \"burrrnt.\" I made her repeat this last word four times before I understood her, and assured her that we were well-coated in sunscreen. We went in search of a motel (for us) and campsite (for Masa) and were very fortunate to find them both in one complex, an adorable, out-of-the-way place run by a friendly Dutch couple. As Masa set up his tent, we took a dip in the frigid, scum-surfaced pool. On our way out to buy groceries, we saw another cyclist checking in and recognized him as Earl, a 71-year old from Nebraska who had also been on our boat from Wellington.
We decided to invite them both to dinner at our place and bought the makings for a feast in tiny Cheviot's only grocery store. Before dinner we still had time for a yoga session in a secluded lawn next to a field full of wooly baah-ing sheep. It felt fantastic to give our sore muscles a proper stretching. It was amusing to host a dinner party in the middle of nowhere to a couple of cycling strangers. Loquacious Earl told us how he'd flown to NZ for free aboard an Army plane, and how this was his first trip abroad. Everyone back home in his small Nebraska town thought he was nuts, but he had been determined to cycle New Zealand for a long time.
We swapped road stories and found his complaints (sadistic truck drivers) to match ours exactly. Meantime, Masa smiled and shoveled alarming quantities of pasta into his face. Both our guests said they were going to get an early start the next morning. Fred looked at me hopefully and I shook my head. No way was I going to be part of a 120-km race to Christchurch, where Masa had a rendezvous with his girlfriend at three o'clock. \"Maybe we'll see you on the road,\" I said to Earl and Masa as they retreated to their respective tents.