Graffiti or art?

On one of our fairly frequent rides down to the local café and supermarket, we noticed a young man doing a painting on a Chorus cabinet by the side of the road. I called out “Wow!” as we rode past, which he ackowledged with a wave. It looked intriguing, so on our way home, we stopped by and had a chat with him. 

Talking to the artist (photo by John)

Tawa to Gear Homestead

On Sunday 20 March, we went for a gentle ride to investigate whether the Kenepuru to Porirua section of Te Ara Tawa was open for use yet. I was still coming right from what was ailing me the previous week, so didn’t want to do anthing too energetic. But I figured I could “cope” with lunch at the Gear Homestead Café!

We parked at the Takapu Road station carpark, which is the beginning of Te Ara Tawa, and pedalled off towards Kenepuru. We were disappointed to find the path along the railway line to Porirua still blocked. (PS - We went there again a week later, on Easter Sunday, but still no luck. Celia Wade-Brown, Wellington mayor, stated on Facebook that it will be officially opened at 3pm on 7 April.)

At Kenepuru, the new track to Porirua was still fenced off (photo by John)

Mangaroa Valley and Te Marua

On Wednesday 16 March we were due to go for a Folding Goldies ride. The plan was to take the train to Wallaceville, then bike through Mangaroa Valley to Te Marua, and down the Hutt River trail to Janus Bakkerij, and train back. Organiser Alastair Smith provided a map, which is here. 

That week I was not feeling well, and the forecast was for a cold, wet and windy day (summer seemed to have come to an end), so on the day before, I warned John that if the weather turned out horrible, I wouldn’t be going. It did, and I didn’t go. But John went.

Wellington Waterfront – Dragon boat races and other delights

It’s a while since I last wrote up any rides, but that doesn’t mean that we haven’t been biking. I’ve been a bit under the weather, but we’ve still managed to do some undemanding cycling.

After our exhausting ride to the Makara Wind Farm, described in my last blog, I vowed I would not go anywhere the next day (Sunday 6 March), but it was a fine, warm, breezy day, and there were things going on at the Wellington waterfront that would be fun to take pictures of, so we went for a short ride on the Giants (non-e bikes). This blog post is more about the activities we took photos of, than about the ride.

Ride to the Source – West Wind Windfarm at Makara

Last Saturday 5 March, we took part in an e-bike ride to the West Wind windfarm at Makara. We recently joined a Meetup group called the Wellington Chargers, the members of which all ride electric bikes. Organiser Alastair Smith (yes, he’s also organiser of the Folding Goldies – he gets around!) put it this way on the Meetup site: “Let’s check out where the power for our e-bikes comes from, with a ride to the West Wind windfarm at Makara”. Hence the title “Ride to the Source” (his words).

The West Wind Windfarm (photo by John)

Wairarapa ride – Martinborough to Gladstone

On Wednesday 2 March, having spent several days at my desk making changes to my blog, and not having biked for ten days, we thought we should do a substantial ride somewhere. And since there weren’t many rides listed in the Wairarapa Rides tab, we decided to remedy that by biking the route we had done when we took part in the Martinborough Charity Fun Ride, back in November. 

But instead of doing the 48 km loop without any stops in the middle, as there are no cafés along the way (how barbaric!), we decided to go as far as Gladstone so we could stop for lunch at the Gladstone Inn. This effectively meant we were doing the 67 km loop.

A few changes to the blog

As I am coming up to the third anniversary of this blog, I have been making some changes, and I hope, improvements.

It partly came about as a result of the fear of losing it all, if some internet or computer glitch should wipe some or all of it. A great deal of time and effort has gone into creating the blog, and while I hope that others “out there” are enjoying reading about our biking adventures, it is also a visual diary for ourselves.

I started by copy-and-pasting our major away trips into separate documents for myself. Then came the idea that some of our readers might like to see these trips as separate entities, to make them easier to find. We think – we hope – that other (retired? or maybe overseas?) cyclists might get ideas from our rides for their own explorations of our beautiful country. So I created a separate tab (across the top of the blog), where I have detailed our major trips, with links to the relevant posts.

Tawa to Hongoeka Bay

Last Sunday, we set out with a plan to bike from Tawa to Mana, have lunch and bike back. We ended up going quite a bit further, covering a total of 41.5 km.

We started out from Tawa’s Takapu Road Station carpark, riding on Te Ara Tawa, the very nice walking and cycling path that runs along the railway line, through quiet suburban streets, and then along the Porirua Stream as far as Kenepuru station.

On a Sunday, there was plenty of parking at the Takapu Road station carpark (photo by John)

The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo

This was nothing to do with biking, but it was quite an event, so I will write about it anyway.

This past weekend Wellington has been host to the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo. It is the second time this grand show has been brought to Wellington. When it was here in 2000, I attended and loved it. This time however, I hummed and ha’ed about going. I wanted to, but John wasn’t interested in going, and anyway, it was very expensive, so I reluctantly decided not to go. Then when reports about it started showing up in the media, I so regretted my decision.

It was very lucky then, that a Scottish country dancing friend rang me on Saturday morning, and asked if I was interested in going to that evening’s show. A relative of hers was not able to go, so the ticket was going cheap. I was thrilled.

Ciclovía, Ataturk Memorial Park, and the Wellington Waterfront

Sunday 14 February was a perfect day for the now yearly event of Ciclovía. For a whole day, from 9 am to 9 pm, the road between Shelly Bay and Scorching Bay was closed to motorised traffic, so that the people of Wellington could walk, cycle, scooter, skate, skateboard, push wheelchairs and pushchairs, ride cargo bikes, tandems and even unicycles, along the 4.2 km distance without the danger from cars.

Again, the day was a huge success, as apparently more than 3000 people, including lots of families with children, took the opportunity to do so.

For us the day was much more than Ciclovía. We left home at 11 am, and got home at 8 pm, having biked 49 km, though obviously we weren't biking all of that time. We parked at Greta Point, and on our e-bikes, we pedalled along Evans Bay and Cobham Drive to Shelly Bay Road.

Shelly Bay Road (photo by John)

Te Ara o Whareroa – again!

When we went on our last ride – the Folding Goldies ride to Te Ara o Whareroa – my sister was going to come along. However, in the end she wasn’t able to make it, so when her birthday came round soon after, we suggested that we could make a special birthday trip one day, and shout her lunch.

This time Aimée was to use John’s e-bike, while he rode the non-electrified Giant. Again we took the train to Waikanae from Takapu Road Station.

On the train to Waikanae (photo by John)

Folding Goldies Ride – Te Ara o Whareroa

Last Wednesday was probably Wellington’s hottest day so far this summer. According to the official records the temperature reached 28 degrees, but in the suburbs, I am sure it went higher. John’s own weather station indicated 29.2 degrees in the afternoon, and lots of people were suffering from the heat and lack of wind. Funny, isn’t it, people in Wellington seem to be always complaining about the wind, but when it’s not there, we miss it!

Fortunately, we were biking in Kapiti that day, and there was a nice sea breeze, which kept us from overheating. We went on the first Folding Goldies ride for 2016, biking from Waikanae to Paekakariki, and riding the newly opened Te Ara o Whareroa – a wonderful track through Queen Elizabeth II Park.

e-Bike Group Ride

Yesterday we went on a e-bike group ride, organised by Switched On Bikes. This is a company set up in 2015 by Ryan O’Connell, who is very keen to promote electric bikes as a great means of getting around Wellington. He has a fleet of e-bikes for hire, and also sells e-bikes, and he runs e-bike tours of Wellington. This ride was one of the free Wellington Region Summer Cycling Events. 

John had met Ryan before, but I hadn't. When we got there, Ryan greeted us with “Hi, I’ve read your blog”. Yessss!

There was quite a good turn out. Twenty people took part, including Ryan and his team of three. We met at the Switched On Bikes premises on Queen’s Wharf (near the Westpac helicopter). Some had their own e-bikes and some used hire bikes. One person hadn’t ridden any kind of bike for a long time. Those who hired bikes had the opportunity to cruise around the wharf for a bit to get the feel of the e-bikes.

Waiting for more people to turn up (photo by John)

Waikanae to Paekakariki and Pukerua to Tawa

Last Sunday, 17 January, we took the train to Waikanae with the e-bikes. As we started to wheel the bikes onto the train, the guard called out that we couldn’t get on as there were already three bikes in the allocated space. And there was only one carriage – because it was a Sunday, I suppose. However, we told the guard we could fold the bikes down. “Ah, that’s OK then”, he said. But he told us to get on board and then fold them, “or else we’ll be here all day”.

One of the folded bikes and a satisfied guard (photo by John)

Upper Hutt to Petone

On Monday 11 January, we had arranged with our friend Pat to take the train to Upper Hutt, and bike back to Petone from there. As we had dinner with my sister Aimée the night before, I suggested she might like to come along also. She hummed and ha’ed a bit, but then decided that, yes, she would come along.

As Aimée does not have her own bike, she would be using one of our Giants. John would be riding the other Giant, and I would ride my e-bike. She came to fetch the bike from us, and we all met up at Petone, to take the train to Upper Hutt.

The trains allow only three bikes per carriage. The front carriage already had one bike in it, so we rushed to the second carriage. But as there were four of us, the guard warned us we could only have three bikes. “No problem”, we said, and John folded up the two Giants. The guard was satisfied.

Paekakariki to Waikanae

We are having quite a nice summer – plenty of sunshine and, despite predictions of horrendous winds thanks to an El Niño pattern, we have had many days with just gentle breezes. Having said that however, as I am writing this, we are indeed being subjected to fierce winds, and I worry for the pohutukawa trees in our garden, which are just coming into flower now (two weeks later than normal). The wind might shred the flowers before they’ve even come out properly. Darn!

Wednesday last week (6 January) it was a gorgeous warm day, and we decided to go and check out the newly built Te Ara o Whareroa cycle trail through Queen Elizabeth II Park. The trail is due to be officially opened on Saturday 23 January, but it was completed several weeks ago.

Summer evening ride in the city

Tuesday 5 January was such a lovely day, that we had early dinner, and went into town with the bikes to have another look at the pohutukawa in Parliament Grounds. When we came here on Christmas Day, it had not yet started flowering. Unfortunately, because we’d had warm weather between Christmas and New Year, and then two days of heavy rain, the pohutukawa was already past its best. We should have gone on New Year’s Day to see it in its full glory. I was disappointed, but it still looked pretty good.

Richard John Seddon, NZ Premier 1893-1906, seems to approve of the massive pohutukawa,
even if I was disappointed at having missed seeing it at its best (photo by John)

Christmas Day City Ride

Christmas Day 2015 was a beautiful day – sparkling sunshine, warm and no wind. As our daughter and her family would not be joining us until a few days after Christmas, we were free to make the most of this one day of the year, on which the city would be completely empty – ideal for biking in places where we would not normally go.

So after pleasant lunchtime drinks and nibbles at my sister’s, we headed into town with our e-bikes in the back of the car.

We parked in Hobson Street, in Thorndon, and biked towards Parliament grounds. One of the aims was to see the large pohutukawa in the grounds, which I was hoping would be in full flower. It is a huge tree, and when it is in full flower, it is a magnificent sight. It has a personal significance for me, as it somehow reminds me of my mother, who died just before Christmas ten years ago. Unfortunately, the pohutukawas seem to be flowering later than usual this year, and this special tree hadn’t even started yet. We would have to try again in a week or so.

To our surprise, we found the Parliament buildings covered in scaffolding and sheathed in shrink wrap plastic and blue netting. Presumably maintenance will be carried out during the summer break.

Parliament buildings are closed for the summer break, but there must be activity in the Beehive,
as the flag is flying on top of it 

Wellington South Coast

This blog post is out of sequence. I've got so many to catch up on, I had forgotten about this one.

On Monday 14 December, the day before we went on our ride with Pat (described below), John and I went for a ride on Wellington's South Coast. They say “you can't beat Wellington on a good day”. This was such a day.

We parked near Lyall Bay and rode along the foreshore. The sea was flat and a gorgeous colour.

Tapu te Ranga Island, off Island Bay (photo by John)

Hutt River Trail, with new convert, Pat

One of the most satisfying aspects of my blog is that it sometimes enthuses other people to take up cycling. Our friend Pat is one of my most loyal readers, and while we were in the South Island, she let people know on Facebook, that she had “surprised herself”, by buying a folding bike – a Giant Expressway (the new improved version of our original folders).

Incidentally, Pat is well used to biking, but had sold her bike many years ago, thinking she would no longer need it. She is also a very fit walker, who has hiked in Nepal, and who thinks nothing of climbing up Mt Kaukau of a morning – something that I stand in awe of, and would absolutely balk at. (PS: Pat says that climbing up Mt Kaukau is still quite a slog.)

Of course, we were delighted at her purchase, and on Tuesday 15 December, we met up at the Petone roundabout carpark, to go cycling on the Hutt River Trail.

Pat and Désirée near the Hikoikoi Reserve (photo by John)