February 27 - Greta Valley to Kaikoura - 105 km

First, I'll apologize to everybody for this blog entry - you'll see why by the time you finished reading it.  How's the snow in BC?

The skies cleared overnight and we got a good start.  We are on highway #1, not too hilly and not a huge amount of traffic.  The shoulders range from wide to non-existent; unfortunately a lot of the edges have "rumble bumps," those annoying lumps of white paint that make your bike shudder.

 These first two photos are of the rolling hills early in the morning when the light is nicer.

Here's a contender for the world's smallest railway station.  

The road runs adjacent to the railway for much of our day, so the grades aren't too bad.

We pulled into Cheviot about 09:15 and had a huge second breakfast at the cafe there. Their baking goodies looked so good that I could have stayed there and devoured them all day. This picture is of the church adjacent the cafe - unusual as it is river rock & cement construction instead of masonry. The statue belongs to the cafe.

Further along I took this shot of a river bed from the bridge crossing it (railway bridge in the background).  This is typical of many of the river beds - very wide and gravelly with multiple river streams braiding their way along the bed.  I suspect when there is a lot of run-off the river fills its bed and becomes very impressive.

This one cracks me up.  This house is on its last legs - the roof is rusted and falling off, the paint is gone, the siding is worn.  But, check out the satellite TV dish!

We climbed a pass, but didn't realize it was a pass as it wasn't more than 200 meters high.  Coming down the other side we saw the ocean (I think for the first time since Milford Sound).  Note the heavy kelp close inshore.

The road snaked along the shore alongside the railway track, with numerous short railway tunnels in 

the narrow spots.  At one point there were 3 tunnels side by side - the railway and one for each lane of the highway (sorry, that photo didn't turn out).  And, another bonus, the winds stayed light; those nasty northeasters didn't materialize.

Closer to town the shoreline widened out and became predominently limestone.  One last hill and we came down into the seaside tourist mecca of Kaikoura.  The next photo is from the driveway of our motel looking north and the last is looking south.  See why I apologized (as you shovel)?

We're staying here for a day before we move on.  Have to play tourist, you know.  It looks like it is going to be another shztty day in paradise.

Quake update - Unfortunately no live recoveries since last week.  Fewer aftershocks, but they had a 4.1 (depth 5 km) aftershock which rattled people.  They are getting more power and water back to the affected parts of the city.

We watched an interview with a fellow from Adventure South Touring (Jerry & Ledddy's tour operator for their last trip?).  They are meeting tourists at CC airport and taking them out of town on their tours, so they are trying to operate as normally as possible.  He emphasized that it is only a small part of CC that has been badly affected and that the best thing tourists could do is come and support the NZ people and their economy by having a great vacation.  

So, if you know of anybody contemplating a trip here, encourage them to come.  It would be the best 

show of support for NZ that you could make.