Day Eight - Cromwell to Queenstown

kawarauriver
Originally uploaded by bpelley.

We thought this was going to be an easy day. We only had 55km to go to our final destination of Queenstown. Still, we got a relatively early start at 8am. Unfortunately, the wind had been blowing all night and it continued straight into the next day. It hit us right in the face starting at 8am and continued all day. We pedalled and pedalled and pedalled, but didn't seem to make any headway. For most of the morning, we followed a narrow and winding road along the gorge of the Kawarau River. The ride was very scenic, but we were using all of our concentration staying on the road for fear of being blown off. There were a great many parts we walked just to be safe. We stopped for a bit at the Roaring Megs rapid and watched people "frogging" (dressed in wetsuits and flippers, they boogie board down the rapids of the river). We finally reached a good stopping point for lunch at the Kawarau River bridge which is now also a new bungy jumping center. We watched several people make the leap while eating in the cafe overlooking the jump site. Some people needed more convincing than others, but everyone we saw made the jump.
Reluctantly, we got back on the road and rode the final 20km to Queenstown. The 20km turned out to be 30km, but we did make it (again stopping to walk our bikes a few times so we didn't get knocked off!) and finally rode into Queenstown.
Our final B&B bike stop was perched on the side of a mountain overlooking all of Queenstown and Lake Wakatipu. After our showers we tried to rally and go out for dinner, but we discovered that you can call any restaurant in Queenstown and they will put your order in a taxi for you! Within a half an hour, we were enjoying Indian food sitting on comfortable sofas watching Bogart and Bacall in The Big Sleep. What a perfect ending to our big bike trip.
For more pictures from Day Eight, click here.