8th Dec 2010 - More Kauris and a Slight Buckle in my Wheel
From Paparoa Motor Camp to Dept of Conservation (DOC) trounson forest campsite about 60 miles, veru fortunately lots of them were flat and we had the wind behind us a fair bit., First of all we went to the Kauri Museum. Kauris are probably more often known as gum trees. They were cleared in by the thousand as the settlers got the land ready for farming. They can grow to an immense size and the kauri museum gave examples of this through photos and logs from trees that had been cut down. They are certainly amazing trees. They exude a resin when damaged so an old tree can have a mass of resin or gum around its roots. So when the land had been cleared there was a period when gum diggers would recover the gum from the ground. The value of this was not just commercial in terms of polish, etc, but also the gum could be shaped and polished so it had an ornamental quality like jet. The Kauri Museum gave us the story of the lives of gum diggers and just about everyone else that was part of the kauri exploitation ecosystem, right down to the life of the towns that grew up as the settlers began to farm.The area is and was heavily beef and dairy focussed. As a veggie that doesn't produce that much of use to me, though milk is certainly useful. It is sad to see how little there is left of the Kauri forests. It's also a evident that the vegetarian is a rare creature around here.After two hours at the museum we zoomed off to Ruawei where we got lunch from a Four Square supermarket *nd ate it by the broad river estuary. Margaret, a statistician from Cambridge chatted to us. Her positive description of the DOC campsite that I'm now at was part of the reason for coming here. She mentioned that NZ is in a mild recession so it isn't that easy to get work here at the moment. We discussed travelling. She asked if we were permanent cycle tourists living cheap for years on end. We liked the idea but confessed to having jobs to go back to. I guess there are eternal cyclists moving around continental blocks wiith the seasons but that isn't our situation. We've heard tales of these mythical (?) creatures before, who cycle between climate zones following an endless summer. You'd need a bit more money...We eventually headed up to Dargaville - flat with a following wind. We then hung around shopping and munching for an amazing hour outside the Countdown supermarket. And finally at 6pm we headed to where we now, once again helped by the wind and a gentle valley road. Finally did the hilliest bit of the day in the final 8kms to the DoC campsite. Moderately busy but settled down to a nice salad with some Mac's black beer deagged her, mostly by me (Steve). My rear wheel wasn't too happy (too much beer perhaps?) and a spoke gave way about half way from Dargaville. I can cope by slackening off my back brakes a bit so the resulting wobble in my back wheel doesn't cause the wheel to catch. Hmmmm, last time a spoke broke in that wheel was near Mallaig when heading for a ferry and it didn't get mended until we got back home.Now off to bed.Now off to bed.
From Paparoa Motor Camp to Dept of Conservation (DOC) trounson forest campsite about 60 miles, veru fortunately lots of them were flat and we had the wind behind us a fair bit., First of all we went to the Kauri Museum. Kauris are probably more often known as gum trees. They were cleared in by the thousand as the settlers got the land ready for farming. They can grow to an immense size and the kauri museum gave examples of this through photos and logs from trees that had been cut down. They are certainly amazing trees. They exude a resin when damaged so an old tree can have a mass of resin or gum around its roots. So when the land had been cleared there was a period when gum diggers would recover the gum from the ground. The value of this was not just commercial in terms of polish, etc, but also the gum could be shaped and polished so it had an ornamental quality like jet. The Kauri Museum gave us the story of the lives of gum diggers and just about everyone else that was part of the kauri exploitation ecosystem, right down to the life of the towns that grew up as the settlers began to farm.The area is and was heavily beef and dairy focussed. As a veggie that doesn't produce that much of use to me, though milk is certainly useful. It is sad to see how little there is left of the Kauri forests. It's also a evident that the vegetarian is a rare creature around here.After two hours at the museum we zoomed off to Ruawei where we got lunch from a Four Square supermarket *nd ate it by the broad river estuary. Margaret, a statistician from Cambridge chatted to us. Her positive description of the DOC campsite that I'm now at was part of the reason for coming here. She mentioned that NZ is in a mild recession so it isn't that easy to get work here at the moment. We discussed travelling. She asked if we were permanent cycle tourists living cheap for years on end. We liked the idea but confessed to having jobs to go back to. I guess there are eternal cyclists moving around continental blocks wiith the seasons but that isn't our situation. We've heard tales of these mythical (?) creatures before, who cycle between climate zones following an endless summer. You'd need a bit more money...We eventually headed up to Dargaville - flat with a following wind. We then hung around shopping and munching for an amazing hour outside the Countdown supermarket. And finally at 6pm we headed to where we now, once again helped by the wind and a gentle valley road. Finally did the hilliest bit of the day in the final 8kms to the DoC campsite. Moderately busy but settled down to a nice salad with some Mac's black beer deagged her, mostly by me (Steve). My rear wheel wasn't too happy (too much beer perhaps?) and a spoke gave way about half way from Dargaville. I can cope by slackening off my back brakes a bit so the resulting wobble in my back wheel doesn't cause the wheel to catch. Hmmmm, last time a spoke broke in that wheel was near Mallaig when heading for a ferry and it didn't get mended until we got back home.Now off to bed.Now off to bed.