OK, last day. Had to get the bike back to Christchurch by about four in the afternoon so not much time to hang about taking photos. Even so, found time to head over to Lake Pukaki for one last shot of Mount Cook and the Southern Alps.
At Burkes Pass there was one more photo stop.
After that it was just a matter of covering ground to Chch, but we took the twistier 'inland tourist route' It's always a relief when there are no awkward questions about new dents or scratches when you return a bike. Finished the day off with a slap up curry and beer.
I quite liked that big Yamaha- the engine has plenty of character (like my 1100GS) and it was certainly comfortable. Pretty economical too- I was filling up around 350 to 380km IIRC. One thing it did do was make up my mind about whether I was going for soft or hard bags for my own bike (we're hoping to take it down to Africa next year)- the flexibility and light weight of the Wolfman bag on the back was so much better than the Givi hard bags, which like all hard bags weighed a ton. Soft bags every time, I reckon.
NZ is pretty expensive at the moment (when I first went there it was $3.40 to the UK pound, now it's 1.95 or so
), but if you can take your camping gear then semi wild sites like the Mavora Lakes are cheap and beautiful places to camp. Distances ain't huge, but that encourages stopping and taking pix, so no bad thing.
We did get a bit more biking in courtesy of some friends in Auckland with a quick trip up to Keri Keri on their Ducatis. I really liked the 860, even if its footpegs were in a mad place.
Topic: New Zealand: A long way, but worth it. (Read 8867 times)
