The original schedule or as much as we had looked like this:

Tuesday 6^th– Pick up the bikes in Christchurch and bike to Ashburton.

It was a long bike ride the first day.

Wednesday 7^th – Bike Ashburton to Timaru

Thursday 8^th – Bike Timaru to Oamaru

Friday 9^th – Bike Oamaru to Waiakouaiti

Saturday 10^th – Bike Waiakouwaiti to Dunedin

Sunday 11^th – Extra day, just in case.

Here’s what actually happened.

Wine!

Tuesday 6^th – Pick up bikes in Christchuch and bike to Rakaia River

Wednesday 7^th – Bike from Rakaia River to Ashburton in the morning. Spend the afternoon at a wine tasting and playing on the internet.

Thursday 8^th – Catch the bus to Oamaru in the morning. Spend the afternoon biking along the coast road to Hampden.

Friday 9^th – Walk to the Moeraki Boulders at dawn, bike to Palmerston by lunch. After lunch bike to Waiakouaiti. Get picked up by friends in Waikouaiti to watch the Rugby World Cup opening ceremonies and match in their living room in Dunedin.

Plenty of time for play

While sitting in a MacDonald’s in Ashburton, we were faced with a choice; haul down the coast doing 90 k or 6-8 hours a day on the bike and sightseeing from the handlebars because we said we’d bike to Dunedin, or do we catch a bus part of the day and scale back to 40-50 k a day and 4-5 hours on the bike to take time for wine tasting, scenic photography and a more relaxing vacation. We chose to slow down and see New Zealand. We could have made it, but it seemed silly. So, we jumped on a bus to Oamaru and biked the hilly part.

This is a beautiful country worth seeing, we made a good choice.