My friend T had asked me to come to Gisborne to help do some work around a house that her deceased son had owned. I was at first reluctant but decided that it would be an interesting adventure.
I had a meeting to go to on the day I was planning to leave so I had packed the bags and loaded the bike on the back of the car ready for a speedy departure. According to Maps the distance was 537 kilometres or thereabouts taking the fastest route. It was predicted to take 7½ hours.
Wellington had rare nice start to the day being very mild and even warm. It felt like summer. I wandered down to the barber and had my well overdue haircut. I was starting to look like some eccentric old bloke I thought. Then it was a walk to CAB picking up some cherries along the way. I had a bit of time so I stopped for a coffee.
The meeting was long and didn’t seem to go anywhere with some people dominating which is very irritating. While sitting there I suddenly realised that I had forgotten to pick up my cherries. That was the third thing I had left behind in an hour. A cap and then my glasses at the barber’s. I wondered about my memory for a moment.
Fortunately when I returned to the café they had kept my cherries for me. That was so nice.
I got away soon after getting home. The route I took was up towards Palmerston North and then over Saddle Hill to Woodville. The GPS said it was the fastest but I think with all the traffic delays it would have been quicker going up through Greytown.
I stopped for lunch and coffee at Woodville and then it was through to Napier where I stopped to get fuel. Then I had a hold up going out of Napier. It was one of the many roadworks that I encountered during the journey. It was rather slow going from Napier to Wairoa. There were many one way stretches and even a bailey bridge to go over. Many of these were controlled by traffic lights. I can see why the road was closed for so long, there were dropouts all along the route, the hills were scarred with slips but where there was native bush it seemed to have been spared. The creeks and streams were still full of forestry slash and I guess what is left is just a small percentage of what came out of the hills. I had forgotten what steep, narrow and windy route it was. The contractors have done an amazing job getting the road open. T had driven the road six weeks previously and said the progress since she came up had been significant.
A cyclone certainly wrecks devastation on the land but it also heals quickly and it possible to see the green starting to appear in places where there was once mud.
I stopped briefly at Wairoa to go to the loo and stretch my legs. I finally arrived in Gisborne at 7:30pm. An eight hour drive it was which is half an hour longer than predicted by Maps. The hour and half from Wairoa was on a road that also had experienced its fair share of damage however, it is not as steep and windy as the Napier to Wairoa section.
Finally I arrived in Wainui a seaside suburb of Gisborne. I will be interested to see the famed surf beach just around the corner.
Some of the driving left a lot to be desired with one bloke passing just before a blind corner and another passing on double yellow lines. They were really lucky not kill themselves and some other poor sod coming the other way. New Zealand drivers are so bad it is no wonder we kill so many. Part of the problem is that our roads are relatively narrow, full of vehicles and lots of trucks which are very long and are difficult to pass even when there are passing lanes as the truck and trailer units are so long.
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