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| Pelorus Sound |
The skies are clear blue today, and I have a lazy day. First, it's 20 miles over gentle hills to Havelock. The winds have shifted to the north and I'm cycling north, but that's ok for the short distance. The route is pretty, without being special on a NZ scale, the cycling marred only by the occasional, but too frequent, thunderous trailer truck. (This is on the main road to the port for ships to the North Island.)
Havelock was once a gold town, but is now a sleepy harbor and marina - I'm sipping cappuccino in the sunshine on the quay side at the moment. The town is the "mussel capital of the world", so I'll try some Green Shell (also known as Green Lipped) Mussels for lunch before cycling on. This is also where the physicist Rutherford grew up (he was born nearby), and there's a monument somewhere, but I can't figure out where. Also Pickering, who was on the Caltech faculty, grew up here.
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| Shayne Water Skiing |
The mussels were the best I've ever had - plump and fresh tasting. Cycling along the bays of the Marlborough Sounds after lunch was idyllic - just like in the travel brochures. The weather is still perfect, sunny and breezy so it's not too hot. I'm staying in a Backpackers at the end of a few km dead end road in a tiny place called Anakiwa. This too is idyllic, overlooking Queen Charlotte Sound. It's run by an English couple, Tanya and Shayne, who took it over a few months ago, and is very small - tonight there is only one other guest.
I decided to do some preventive maintenance on the bike. The rear tyre is getting much more wear than the front one, so I decided to rotate them. I was dreading changing the tyres, since for some reason they are very hard to get on and off the rims, but I did better today, and it wasn't too difficult in the end. I hope I didn't make any holes!
I spent the evening on a speedboat with a beautiful blonde! Shayne and Tanya were going out water skiing, and offered me and the other guest a tour of the local bays. We went zooming up the Sound, stopping for views of the shags and a seal, and also the expensive houses, accessible only by boat, dotted around the bay.
