Had the day off yesterday.
Foolishly decided on a whim that I'd climb the high peak behind the seaside town of Motueka, near
Nelson. Got going about lunchtime and climbed, and climbed and climbed. Easy roads, nice wide gravel
forestry roads to begin with. About half way, 8 km in the forest finished and the road became
increasingly steeper, gritty and rutted. The temperature got cooler as I climbed. Maybe the sea
breeze (what little of it there was) was cooling things down. Whatever it was, I was glad that it
was cooler. I was sweating profusely and 85F or 30C was too hot for climbing like this.
By mid afternoon I was 2/3rd's of the way up. The coastline spread out below me and the Moutere
hills below looked tiny. I was beginning to realise that it was a lot further and steeper than I
realised. The road was no more than a gritty feldspar and quartz sand track. Boulders and ruts
covered the surface. The gutter to one side was in places was 6 foot wide and 5 foot deep run-off
channel. The pine forest was replaced by scrub and stunted beech trees.
By 4.30pm I had finished my chocolate bars, was rationing my water and wondering what I was doing. I
hadn't been doing much riding over Christmas and my fitness wasn't the greatest. Stupid, stupid,
stupid was what I was beginning to think. It was too steep to ride now. The bike got pushed the last
few kilometres. My left thighs began to cramp the last mile. I was resting frequently and stretching
to stop the cramps. Push, rest, ride, push, rest, ride.....
Finally I reached the top. I've never been so glad to see the end of a climb and never felt such a
sense of anticlimax. I finally reached the radio tower perched on top of the mountain and well, that
was it. It was a grassy flat and nothing very interesting after all that. The view was spectacular
but no different than the view from the track 50m lower, or much different from the view 200m lower,
or... <sigh> Still the feeling of accomplishment was worth it. I rested for a 1/2 hour taking in the
views, finished the last of my water then lowered the seatpost, wound up the front suspension and
then let 'er rip. Forty minutes of downhill back to the car, 5 minutes to load up then a quick stop
at the nearest Dairy to get more water and the carbohydrate loaded delicious pastry wonder that is
the hot meat pie...
All in all, it was a great climb and I'm feeling it today - not as badly as I thought that I
would though.
Best part of six hours, a 29km (18 mile) round trip, and a climb of 1330 metres (that's 4300 feet).
I'm stuffed.
--
Westie