Today was going to be a pretty long day as well, as we were meeting up with Raewyn’s parents in Ranfurly. The trail from Lauder to Oturehua passes through a gorge with some impressive viaducts and a couple of short tunnels. In other words, a number of photo opportunities. We arrived in Oturehua at around 11:30 and decided to have an early lunch there. This also gave us time to visit Gilchrist’s General Store, the longest continually running store in New Zealand and, like the hardware store in Invercargill we visited, was half-museum half-shop. They had some old-style lollies for sale and we couldn’t resist availing ourselves of some giant Jaffas (remember them?).
From Oturehua it was a bit more of a climb to the highest point on the trail. From there it was downhill to Wedderburn, about 8 km away, which we managed to ride solely on gravity and a tailwind – no pedalling! Then from Wedderburn to Ranfurly we were averaging around 30 km/hr across the Maniototo valley. Here the trail is dead straight and slightly downhill, and we still had a tailwind. We passed a number of people battling into the wind going the other way, and basically smiled and said nothing. What can you say? ‘Only 25 km to go...’?
Raewyn’s parents had also made good time and arrived in Ranfurly in the early afternoon. We rewarded ourselves with a break from cooking dinner and went out for a meal at the pub instead.
(Total distance biking: 49.9 km, 177.0 km cumulative)
Light and colours at the Poolburn Gorge
One of the Poolburn Gorge tunnels
Raewyn on the Poolburn Gorge viaduct
Gilchrist's general store, Oturehua
The sign says it all!
Riding across the Maniototo plains towards Ranfurly
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