CHAFING

Monday 2nd March 2009

Day 2: Archeron to Cob Cottage

I have chafing - Ouch!
Today started at 7am - neither of us sleep very well last night, Scott because of the strong after dinner coffee he had & myself - I think I was just a little unsettled.
We were woken a lot through out the night by various animals - possums on tin roofs, a wild pig running through the campsite squealing at the top of it lungs & not to mention the birds!!
Who said nature was quiet & peaceful place !
Hit the road 8:30am - today we are biking through the Molesworth Station the next camping spot is 60km away so we have a descent day of riding ahead.
The road through the molesworth was alot rougher than we both were anticipating so the riding was much slower.
They are currently lying broad band cable through the center of the road so the road had been dug up making riding a little harder than it should have been.
Scott got his 1st puncture 36km into the day, while he was fixing it we heard the roar of motorbike & weer visited by 'Top of the south' riders (Andre & Jason) they were kind enough to stop & check we were OK before heading off on there way to Hamner.
50km in& only 10km to go to the campsite & we had to cross a Ward pass - Can't be too hard we said to each other and then we saw it! 1.7km - 200mtr altitude hill climb - brutal!
Scott being the power machine he is managed to ride the entire hill - myself I opted to pushing after only making it half way.
Meet another cycle tourist at the top of Ward Pass he was heading to Ch Ch, Scott befriended him & invited him in to C4 for a coffee when he gets back to town.
We arrived at the Cob Cottage campsite to find we were the only people again at the campsite so we took the opportunity to heat some water & have a sponge bath 'Ah La Natural' in the wild, very invigorating for the body & mind to do things like that, not to mention how nice it felt to remove a layer of dust off the bodies.
Now several other campers have arrived so looks like we will be sharing the campsite tonight!

Tomorrow we have a 100km bike ride to Blenheim, we are not sure we will make the full 100km in a day - I guess time will tell.
Both sets of legs are feeling very weary tonight so will just see how the day goes tomorrow?

Both of us are looking forward to our sleeping bags tonight.

RIDE TIME: 4.19 Hours
DISTANCE: 60.40 Km
AVERAGE SPEED: 13.90 km/hour
TOTAL TIME FROM A TO B: 6 hours
TOTAL ASCENT: 845mtrs

Banana's don't travel well on bumpy gravel road! eek