It’s over three weeks since the last bike ride I wrote up. Hmm, this sounds almost like a confession. In that time, we’ve done two rides – 16 and 10 km – on the Giants (i.e. the non-electric bikes), and three rather more substantial rides on the e-bikes.
On Sunday 13 September, we went into Petone to have a look at the Home Ideas Centre (as we are looking to get some work done on our house), and just on the off-chance, we put the bikes in the car too.
After our visit in Petone, we drove to Lower Hutt’s riverside car park, and biked up the valley. It was sunny and calm, but a southerly was expected later in the day.
I was giving my new cycling jacket its first outing. I had a great deal of trouble finding one that fitted, but finally the lovely Jenny at Scott’s Outlet in Petone came up trumps for me. The thermal softshell fabric is beautifully warm and really keeps the wind out, but I miss the convenient pockets of my other blue jacket. Never mind – one can’t have everything perfect …
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| First outing of my new Tineli cycling jacket (photo by John) |
We rode up the eastern bank of the Hutt River, had lunch at our “usual” café, Janus Bakkerij, and continued until some distance beyond the Kennedy Good Bridge. We were happily pedaling along, when John suggested it would be wise to turn around now, as the southerly was about to hit. How did he know? “The going is too easy, we must be getting a tailwind”, he said.
He was right. We turned around and went back to the bridge, where we crossed to the western bank. We now had a southerly headwind, which grew steadily stronger. With our non-e bikes, pedaling into it was quite a bit harder than we've become used to lately on the e-bikes. A good reminder, actually. It is too easy to become complacent.
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| This part of the river bank has been repaired after suffering severe scouring in the May floods (photo by John) |
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| Heading south on the western bank of the river (photo by John) |
We crossed back to the other side over the railway bridge – there is a “tacked on” foot/cycle path – to get back to the car. We had done 16 km.
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The next day, it was still fine (a bonus, as spring has taken such a long time to establish itself), so we went for an easy ride along the Wellington waterfront. We rode 10 km from the far end of Oriental Parade to the Stadium and back. It’s a ride we do often, so there’s nothing much new to say about the ride, but John took some interesting photos, which I’ll share here.
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| Logs on the wharf, seen through the etched glass of the canopy over the footpath near the Stadium (photo by John) |
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| Ferg's colourful kayaks on Queen’s Wharf (photo by John) |
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| Textures on the centre wall of the bridge over the Frank Kitts Lagoon (photo by John) |
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| A forest of posts on Taranaki Street Wharf, with the floating crane Hikitea in the background (photo by John) |
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| Reflections by the Clyde Quay Wharf Apartments (photo by John) |
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