It was a delayed start for me today as unfortunately I had to stay back for a 9:30 AM Disputes Tribunal conference call - the shuttle operator that should have taken four of us to Cape Reinga last year for the Tour Aotearoa failed to repay the $1,200 to us as we didn't use her service - she said she would, however failed to follow through with her promise! That's not playing by the rules in my book and I'm not one to let things like that float away. I had the case all laid out for the Tribunal and she agreed with every point that I made and said it was correct! Case closed! She was instructed to refund the $1,200 within 28 days. Time will tell.
This meant that I was two hours behind the others who had got off to an early start. I didn't muck around, no morning tea stop for me and I caught up with them before lunch. Lunch today was a pre ordered Subway that Ian had collected in Alexandra as we were unsure if there would be a place open for us at about lunch time.
Although a "Rail Trail" and trains are mot supposed to be able to go uphill very well the ride for the best part of 60 km was a steady 1 - 2% uphill gradient. My Aussie riding buddies who are totally unused to "proper" hills were quite concerned that one of the "inclines" on the trail was a hill in their book and there was almost a mutiny from them en masse as at last night's briefing I had said there were no "hills"!
Even though this is my country I am always amazed at how our scenery changes from one day's riding to the next and again this was definitely the case today as we rode further East.
It was decided to not ride our bikes off the trail and then on up the road to Naseby but to continue on the trail and meet up with Ian in the van for a relocate. This was two fold - a) the Aussies don't like hills and it involved riding "up" to Naseby Lodge and b) our group's meterologist (John) has been forecasting rain on Wednesday for some time and so the more KM's we knocked off today would be less to ride in the rain tomorrow and c) after we finish at Middlemarch tomorrow we have a rather long re-locate to get to Omarama. This meant that our distance today was over 100 km and we probably only have 40 km to get out of the way in the morning.
Because I was on a mission to catch the others today I didn't take any photos myself other the GoPro videos I'm now trying to get my head around.
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