Rest day

After about 11 hours sleep we, rather groggily, rose to beautiful cloudless skies and no wind! Sleep really is the answer to all our woes.

We spent a leisurely morning eating muesli (not porridge!) and catching up on this log which had fallen far behind. Feeling virtuous and refreshed we decided to see what Raglan is all about and set off down to the famous surf beaches (as featured in the cult classic film: The Endless Summer).

Our hostel was situated right on the water so we crossed over the foot bridge and straight onto the sand. We walked, enjoying the sunshine for several miles, chatting and paddling in the clear, calm waters. As we left the protection of the harbour the beach widened and the waves picked up in size.

Feeling really refreshed after such a good night's sleep and very happy and relieved to have cycled our last 100km day we went for a run! We left our shoes behind a shrub and ran for 24 minutes each suggesting a silly exercise to do each minute. We did star jumps and cartwheels and hopping and running through the water, amongst other things and had a really magical run. We're both feeling very fit and healthy at the moment and are looking forward to getting back into running when all of our energies aren't consumed with cycling! We reached as far as you could walk which was to the cliffs before Manu Bay where apparently there is one of the longest left-hand breaks in the world. Not that we know what this means, but it's fun to be hip and cool with the surfer kids here.

Feeling really good we wandered home and Claire set off to go to her "stretch class" and I read my book. Claire enjoyed this and joined in with the surfers and their stretching at the bowling club.

We finished the evening with a vege-fest stir-fry which completed a great, healthy, sun-kissed day. Hurray! Three more cycling days to go then we're off to Sydney! Hurray!