Yesterday started great and ended great. The middle, though, was unpleasant.

Our great little cabin by the beach was looking out over water when we woke up. We had a quick breakfast and then a great coffee stop at “The Parsley Pot”.

Picking up our world map sticker from “ECM signs and motorbikes“, Leigh had a surprise for us: He gave us a t-shirt each for free! And they are great t-shirts!

Afterwards, we hit the road. Auckland was really close already so we took our time and went down the west coast towards Auckland. Bought lunch and headed off to the black beaches on this side of the coast. This is where our problems started. The gravel road towards the beach was fine but there was a short drive from the carpark to the beach over sand. I hopped off but Flo actually tried the ride. Turns out that it is really deep and fine sand and there was no way that we could actually get Rocinante up there with a completely worn rear tire. So instead, the bike dropped on sand and we had to completely unload it before we had any chance of getting it up again. In the fine sand, we mostly pushed it around rather than getting it up.

Quite exhausted, we had lunch at the beach with the bike safely back in the carpark. Happy to get to Auckland and a nice spare room with fellow bikers Ruth and Damien, we hopped back onto the bike. A couple of kilometers down the road, we stopped to look up the exact address…which is when Flo realized that his phone was missing. Retracing our steps for almost 100km didn’t help; the phone remained gone.

So we did the sensible thing and just chose to get to our destination. About 2km away from the bed for the night, we stopped at a red traffic light…and the bike dropped. Having no panniers means that it doesn’t stop at a 45 degree angle anymore but falls down all the way, so we both dropped to the ground. It was really quite the fall or I am just unlucky that I have no hip protectors. Anyhow, it hurt. And we cracked a mirror.

As soon as we arrive at Ruth and Damien’s place, things improved dramatically. Sitting down, having a tea and a coffee, talking and getting to know Gypsy, their dog, was great. Flo got to borrow a water blaster which made cleaning the bike very easy. It went from a dirt bike to a shiny one in no time.

In the meantime, Ruth cooked a very yummy dinner for all of us and we had a nice evening after sorting out the logistics from Tuesday.