Cycle: 85km

Being a little nervous about our planned cross country shortcut we got up early and hit the road by 9am. The skies were looking ominous and we were both concerned about Lottie's chain and hanger fix holding. The nearest bike shop was probably in Invercargill...

The scenery today was beautiful. After a couple of days cycling through mostly agricultural coastal land through the Catlins today made a refreshing change. The land was still agricultural but more mountainous and with lots of snow! We gently progressed uphill and took shelter in a farm building through a rain shower. After this we 'ate our frog' by tackling the 13km unsealed section. This was a big risk for us as 13km of loose gravel would be hell, but we thought we'd have a go rather than go the extra 50km going the long, sealed, way round. Luckily the road was well packed mud rather than gravel and we gently worked our way along and were through it before we knew it!

The rest of the day's cycling was on a quiet state highway just avoiding Clinton and SH1. We turned off and took another scenic quiet (but sealed!) road right into Gore. Gore is the second largest city in the Southland and as such had proper supermarkets! Hurray! Fresh fruit and vegetables! Our backpackers was a funny little place called the Old Fire Station. There weren't many rooms, and as is the norm here (unless you've booked) you just write your name on a white board and people come and collect some money later in the evening. There were a couple of other cyclists, but they weren't too friendly. They didn't quite seem to know what they were doing: "we'll just cycle until it's nearly dark then find somewhere to stay", but they'd made it to Gore from Fox Glacier (a strange place to start...) We had a nice evening eating healthy stuff and watching Indiana Jones on the TV. Can't wait for the new one!