Some kind of blog post

As of today, October 19th, I've been in New Zealand for one month. This seems a bit strange, but at this point I'm just going with the flow. Some of which I have documented in photographs.

Last week, one of my coworkers decided to fry a bunch of NZ fish for me and the other new American coworker to try. I managed to get zero pictures of the fish and only one picture of my coffee mug at the bus stop in the driving rain. The fish was very good. Totally worth waiting for the bus in the rain.

That weekend we went tramping. This was very similar to hiking. I was also informed that Kiwis (the birds, not the people or fruit) are very dumb, however are pretty good at staying away from people. Of the three Kiwis I was with (the people, not the bird or fruit) only one of them had seen a Kiwi (the bird, not the people or fruit) in the wild.

A great part of living in a land without lawsuits is that you can have a bridge that says "4 people max" and it's okay.

Down by the river.

We were headed more in that direction.

I was also informed about an hour into this tramping adventure that there would be a river crossing. This quickly explained why I was the only person not wearing shorts.

Owen's phone, which we used briefly for GPS was not working too well. If you pried the back off and removed the battery, you could get it to turn off.

Lunch! Including a peanut butter chocolate bar that was quite delicious.

More lunchtime pics from the top of Mt. Matthews. Which is supposed to be the highest peak in the Wellington area. I think it's 981 meters or something.

A bit further down, but still a really cool area. You can see Wellington on the bay in the background.

After the tramping, actually a couple of days later, we had a pretty great windstorm. I'm told this was above average even for this very Windy City. I almost got knocked over walking home a few times. Some of which looked like the video above. I took it about 100 meters from my house.

Today looked a lot like this. It was the first sunny day in a while so we took advantage. This actually started as Wayne and I riding around and then we ran into Kirk and Mike (please note all of us work in the same place) so we rode some singletrack and looked at stuff. I should also point out that this is about 40 minutes via trails from my new house I'm moving into next week and likely will be on my after work ride.

We even ran into an Emu farm.

And hopefully soon I'll be better at mountain biking.

 

More pictures of NZ

I'm continuing to settle in in my new home in the Southern Hemisphere. And while I haven't ventured much outside of Wellington, I have been enjoying riding around town when I'm not working.

This is just one example of a trail I can ride on my way home from work. IN THE CITY! No need to drive, or even make a special trip, just ride some trail after work. It's been wonderful.

This does lead to some mud on the bike, also on me sometimes, but totally worth the extra cleaning.

When I stopped by the shop on Saturday to go for a ride there were a ton of cyclists having coffee at the cafe pre/post ride. It's very cool to see the cycling community out in force. Hopefully some of them are in need of bike fixing.

Then once again out into the woods. This is Wayne, who is in town for the season from Denver. iRide is now up to three American employees. We are taking over the country, one bike shop at a time.

This is a picture of a leaf. Or maybe several leaves. The plant life here is very cool and differs depending on where you are. At the mountain bike park in town there is a distinctly jungle look about the place. So far I've seen zero panthers though, which I suppose is a good thing for my continued survival.

Today's ride involved some trail but also a lot of gravel road and some pavement. Oh, and a really really strong headwind all the way back to Wellington. I am writing this in a semi haze from just not having any energy left. Good ride and some great views of the water.

 

Tis the season for cyclocross

While cyclocross season rages on back home, here we are entering the summer, i've been told, so cross has wrapped up for the year. However since I have been loaned a cross bike and there is tons of sweet singletrack that is very doable on a cross bike, I'm keeping the American cross season alive in New Zealand.

At one of the high points of my ride today I stopped to have a snack and enjoy the view. I've been experimenting with these rice cakes that people have been telling me so much about. The verdict: they're really good, really cheap, and perfect for a long day on the bike.

You could also see the wind farm. I'm not sure where they plant the wind, but it does seem to grow quite well here.

Wind turbine up close. The man in the blue sweatshirt is a grown person. These things are big.

 

This is a view from the highest point of the day, the Haikori Lookout. The zoom in portion is about where my office is, to the left of the stadium.

After a bit over three hours on the bike, including lots of climbing, I felt like some basketball shorts and a beer was the way to round out my afternoon.

The "Double Trouble" also comes with sweet 3D glasses to read the label.

 

And now it's nap time.

 

Wellington

I made it to Kiwiland. Life is good here. The coffee is really really good. Also there are lots of wooded areas in Wellington which mean that you can kind of go hiking whenever you feel like it. No driving required.

So on Sunday I decided to go for a walk in the woods.

And walk to the top of this hill. The views are pretty incredible.

This was the brief moment of blue sky I saw on Sunday. For the most part it was wet and windy. It felt like home.

 

This is a better panoramic view. Also quite windy and you can see/hear. I was almost worried that I would get blown off of the top of this hill, which probably wouldn't have happened, but decided to go down anyway.

On the way home I ran into this giant tree. Then I saw it's signage:

Thats a very old tree.

 

When I said before you can go hiking whenever, it includes on my way to work. Yesterday's walk in included some sun.

 

Springtime is a good time.

 

Blogging at 37000 ft

Things I've learned this week:

 

TSA lines on Tuesday nights are very, very short.

 

Your second bag to New Zealand costs $150.

 

This ticket is seeming more expensive all of a sudden.

 

If you missed my previous in person announcements, I am headed to the NZ for the next 4 to 5 months to work in a bike shop and just hang out. I think this is a good plan.

However before I left the country I got a chance to work with the Raleigh-Clement cyclocross team. I didn't take many pictures. James was getting putting some final touches on one of our bikes ahead of preride.

We did have a very nice setup. You can see my toolbox all the way down the end.

Cyclocross fans may be the best. This guy was cruising around probably two hours before the first race and 8 hours before the pros started. At least he was comfortable and always in the shade.

One mullet to rule them all. (not pictured: armband tattoo, cutoff jean shorts)

But now that is all behind me. Now I'm here, in Wellington, NZ, about to start work tomorrow. Above is a view from in front of the house I'm staying at this evening. More pics from adventures to come.

 

 

HB does Philly

Myself and the HB crew were just out in Pennsylvania for the Bucks County Classic. I failed to take one single picture of the bike racing. No bikes. No crowds. No dudes in spandex. I guess I just forgot. So here are some pics from our several hours in Philly before we had to fly home.

Useful tip for out of towners: you have to wait for the green light to go.

Lunch at Redding Market. Everything was delicious.

And since the season is now over, seconds were an option.

Walking: a hated activity among cyclists.

We did see some cool stuff. Such as city hall.

Also this fountain.

And the art museum.

At one point the walking was too much for Steve. His hijacking of Alan didn't work for too long.

The city of brotherly love.

Alan was there too.

 

NYC

I'm still on the east coast. Still hanging out before this weekend's bike racing happens outside of Philadelphia, so I decided to hang out around New York for a few days. First stop: natural history museum.

Where there are things like this doll, with the mouth of some real animal.

But mainly I went for stuff like this. Look at those tusks!!

I think this was an early ancestor of the Jackalope.

This was labeled as a Giant Sloth. It was about 10 feet tall, probably equally lazy.

Sideways triceratops!!

And it was THIS BIG!

Basically Dinosaurs are cool. I saw a ton of other great things, but took pictures of dinosaurs.

I also took a picture of this model of a blue whale. Whales are also cool.

Other things I'm into: bike shops.

My friend and fellow Recycled Cycles alum Brendon has a sweet shop in Greenpoint Brooklyn called Silk Road Cycles. If you're in New York and need bike stuff, get ye to this shop.

They have cool bike stuff.

They also have a trailer for dragging bikes from their storage unit to the shop. No cars needed.

Brendon in action on the streets of Brooklyn.

After that difficult effort we retired to a local bar which was playing this strange bike racing discipline on TV. Some kind of dirt track, single speed, brakeless wildness. Thanks Fox Sports North.

Next stop: Philly and the Bucks County Grand Prix. I'll be back with the boys from Hagens for one last hurrah before our season is officially over. Pretty excited.