It's been a while, blogland, huh? Kate arrived into town and it has been an adventure ever since! We hit the road just about two weeks ago and have already had a genuine and adventurous kiwi experience that I never would have thought up in a million years.
First, I will tell you the story of bacon...
Ok, so this is roughly four days into the trip - after a tricky experience in the Mamaku Forest where we had to backtrack out of the Forest to retrieve the much needed for life liquid, also known as water. (Google Earth would later show us that we had taken the wrong fork kilometers before). oops. We've invested in the Garmin Edge 800 (thank you Craig, Wendy, and Jak at Avanti Plus in Taupo - and thanks for the jersey, too - I LOVE it!) so future mis-haps such as these should be minimal and hopefully make for a more enjoyable and less bruise filled trip - we'll see about the less bruises. hmmm, not so sure about that.
Ok, focus, Steph, focus.
Alright, so we made it out of Mamaku! The backtracking and steep gravel roads and thirst and exhaustion had me craving bacon. Bacon, of all things. I don't like bacon. Strange - perhaps my body was craving the salty protein?
Well, we had to detour from our original plans to a surfing town on the west coast called Raglan because of our extra day or two in Mamaku. This led us to the Waikato River Trail (WRT)- a 100+ km mtn bike trail along the...what do you think?? Yeah, along the Waikato River. A stop at the i-site (information site) in Putaruru (pronounced Poot-AIR-oo) to pic up some maps of the trail led us to believe we'd be meandering along the rivers edge along boardwalks (flat), super fancy suspension bridges (flat) and gravel paths (flat). The grades on the brochure maps were labled easy and intermediate. We thought this would be the PERFECT trail to ease into our mtn bike touring, New Zealand style.
Ok, I'm getting off track...back to bacon. So we end up on the WRT and make it to the switchback descent (roughly 24 switchbacks down the valleys edge to the river) around 6 pm. The sun sets at 9 pm in the summer here so we figured we'd go down a bit (we had gravity with us, right?) and pitch the tent along the river somewhere - a picnic table was labled on the map not too far away which seemed like the likely spot. As we start up the path just after the trailhead - which follows a path between two cattle farms, Matt pulls up on an ATV and asks us if we know what's ahead. We smalltalk for a bit and he lets us know that we are welcome to stay at the house just down the way if we decide we don't want to start such a venture so late. We say our goodbyes and check out the descent. It's beautiful - the river inside the valley with a mixture of green native bush and farmland lining the steep valley walls.
We decide to take on the venture in the morning and make our way back to Matt's house. Turns out it's not Matt's house though. He's visiting Mike, the owner of the house and farm. (Don't worry, we are two well-traveled ladies and know how to use our guts to determine if a situation is safe are not - the coast is clear :) We couldn't have been in better hand for the next two adventure-filled NZ style days.
Mike and Matt ask if we want to hop in the truck and take a tour of the property. We agree. Down super steeeeeeeep farm roads with the setting sun in the distance, we make our way to the maize field along the rivers edge. Turns out, the dogs in cages in the back of Matt's truck are hunting dogs and he's going for a little pig hunt. We are invited to follow - how can we decline?! Hehe...
What follows is the most random night of my life. To sum it up: through the maize field (in our cycling shoes!), in knee deep puddles, along thorn filled raspberry bushes, with gps geared dogs (3 are Matt's hunting dogs, and also Snow, Mike's non-hunting dog), Matt's gps -to track the dogs, squealing baby pigs, nighttime showing it's face, a cellphone as a torch (flashlight), 3 other hunting parties - hunting (one of which had a monster spotlight), a fishing boat with a light, lots of yelling in the forest to other hunting parties, glow-worms lining the trail (WOW - so neat), starlit night, hiking in the night as Matt left to find the pig (he told us to keep following the trail and he'd meet back up with us...which he did:)...
and finally,
a single shot...and dead pig (though not by Matt).
Whew, what a night - and we still had a solid 30+minute hike back to the truck.
Can you imagine how utterly terrified we would have been if we had camped along the river's edge that night?! We would have been smack in the middle of a pig-hunting frenzy. Scared crap-less that's for sure...
Eventually the truck climbs the steep roads back to Mike's house nearing midnight.
"What would you like for dinner?" The guys ask.
"Bacon?"
Yeah, literally the first word out of Mike's mouth was bacon...the one thing I had been craving - rather vocally - at the beginning of our crazy mtn-biking-nz-style adventure.
So we ate wild caught bacon and talked till three in the morning.
Thank you so much Mike and Matt, and Snow (the dog) for such an experience... And big thanks for the helicopter ride, and giving us a glimpse to a day in the life at a dairy farm (we got cow doo-dooed on and learned the process of modern day milking). Intriguing.
And this is just the beginning...
First, I will tell you the story of bacon...
Ok, so this is roughly four days into the trip - after a tricky experience in the Mamaku Forest where we had to backtrack out of the Forest to retrieve the much needed for life liquid, also known as water. (Google Earth would later show us that we had taken the wrong fork kilometers before). oops. We've invested in the Garmin Edge 800 (thank you Craig, Wendy, and Jak at Avanti Plus in Taupo - and thanks for the jersey, too - I LOVE it!) so future mis-haps such as these should be minimal and hopefully make for a more enjoyable and less bruise filled trip - we'll see about the less bruises. hmmm, not so sure about that.
Ok, focus, Steph, focus.
Alright, so we made it out of Mamaku! The backtracking and steep gravel roads and thirst and exhaustion had me craving bacon. Bacon, of all things. I don't like bacon. Strange - perhaps my body was craving the salty protein?
Well, we had to detour from our original plans to a surfing town on the west coast called Raglan because of our extra day or two in Mamaku. This led us to the Waikato River Trail (WRT)- a 100+ km mtn bike trail along the...what do you think?? Yeah, along the Waikato River. A stop at the i-site (information site) in Putaruru (pronounced Poot-AIR-oo) to pic up some maps of the trail led us to believe we'd be meandering along the rivers edge along boardwalks (flat), super fancy suspension bridges (flat) and gravel paths (flat). The grades on the brochure maps were labled easy and intermediate. We thought this would be the PERFECT trail to ease into our mtn bike touring, New Zealand style.
Ok, I'm getting off track...back to bacon. So we end up on the WRT and make it to the switchback descent (roughly 24 switchbacks down the valleys edge to the river) around 6 pm. The sun sets at 9 pm in the summer here so we figured we'd go down a bit (we had gravity with us, right?) and pitch the tent along the river somewhere - a picnic table was labled on the map not too far away which seemed like the likely spot. As we start up the path just after the trailhead - which follows a path between two cattle farms, Matt pulls up on an ATV and asks us if we know what's ahead. We smalltalk for a bit and he lets us know that we are welcome to stay at the house just down the way if we decide we don't want to start such a venture so late. We say our goodbyes and check out the descent. It's beautiful - the river inside the valley with a mixture of green native bush and farmland lining the steep valley walls.
We decide to take on the venture in the morning and make our way back to Matt's house. Turns out it's not Matt's house though. He's visiting Mike, the owner of the house and farm. (Don't worry, we are two well-traveled ladies and know how to use our guts to determine if a situation is safe are not - the coast is clear :) We couldn't have been in better hand for the next two adventure-filled NZ style days.
Mike and Matt ask if we want to hop in the truck and take a tour of the property. We agree. Down super steeeeeeeep farm roads with the setting sun in the distance, we make our way to the maize field along the rivers edge. Turns out, the dogs in cages in the back of Matt's truck are hunting dogs and he's going for a little pig hunt. We are invited to follow - how can we decline?! Hehe...
What follows is the most random night of my life. To sum it up: through the maize field (in our cycling shoes!), in knee deep puddles, along thorn filled raspberry bushes, with gps geared dogs (3 are Matt's hunting dogs, and also Snow, Mike's non-hunting dog), Matt's gps -to track the dogs, squealing baby pigs, nighttime showing it's face, a cellphone as a torch (flashlight), 3 other hunting parties - hunting (one of which had a monster spotlight), a fishing boat with a light, lots of yelling in the forest to other hunting parties, glow-worms lining the trail (WOW - so neat), starlit night, hiking in the night as Matt left to find the pig (he told us to keep following the trail and he'd meet back up with us...which he did:)...
and finally,
a single shot...and dead pig (though not by Matt).
Whew, what a night - and we still had a solid 30+minute hike back to the truck.
Can you imagine how utterly terrified we would have been if we had camped along the river's edge that night?! We would have been smack in the middle of a pig-hunting frenzy. Scared crap-less that's for sure...
Eventually the truck climbs the steep roads back to Mike's house nearing midnight.
"What would you like for dinner?" The guys ask.
"Bacon?"
Yeah, literally the first word out of Mike's mouth was bacon...the one thing I had been craving - rather vocally - at the beginning of our crazy mtn-biking-nz-style adventure.
So we ate wild caught bacon and talked till three in the morning.
Thank you so much Mike and Matt, and Snow (the dog) for such an experience... And big thanks for the helicopter ride, and giving us a glimpse to a day in the life at a dairy farm (we got cow doo-dooed on and learned the process of modern day milking). Intriguing.
And this is just the beginning...
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