Taluka to Osla/Seema

The next morning, I was woken up by a rap on the door at 6:00 AM. It was morning tea. As far as rude ways of getting woken up go, this wasn’t terrible. I put my stuff together quickly, drank up my tea and got ready to leave. We walked to a little restaurant type place next door to get breakfast. All it was was a small room with a few wood tables and benches set out at the end and a couple of benches along the wall. It was attached to a smaller section of a room with a wood fire and oven where all the food was cooked. We ate alu parathas with mango pickle for breakfast.

We left a few of our belongings in Taluka where they would be held for us until we returned. The mule and porter for the trek had not arrived, so our guide told us to start the trek and that he would catch up with us. He directed us to walk to the end of the town, which took all of two minutes, and follow the steep downhill trail towards the river. He told us to keep the river to our left for the entire day and we wouldn’t go off-track.

The way out of town was indeed extremely steep. This would not be fun to return on! It was also very well maintained and laid with big stones. I would find out in subsequent days that most Himalayan trails were very rocky compared to the ones back home, and would be very hard on the feet.

We took our own sweet time covering the first few kms by which time our guide caught up with us. We also saw a ton of other people from YHA India out on the trail. This was about the time when I realized what piss-poor shape I was in because practically everyone passed me. :P Our guide tried to get us to pick up the pace but I wanted to conserve my energy for the long 14 km distance we had to cover that day. It would suck to go fast in the beginning and run out of steam towards the end.

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First Himalayan Hike – Har Ki Dun

After having hiked quite a bit in the Cascades for the past two years or so, I thought it would be fun to go hike in the Himalayas while I was still in this part of the world. My original intention was to go hike the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal. The day that I booked my ticket to Kathmandu though, Nepal was struck by a terrible earthquake, which led to me scrapping my plans and deciding to go hike in the Garhwal Himalayas of India instead. I picked the Har ki Dun trek from this list because it was listed as a beginner trek, it wasn’t at too high of an elevation, it seemed like the right time of year to do the trek, and the photo looked gorgeous. J I read up a few other blog reports of people who had done it, found a company in Delhi that could do a customized tour for two people, and enlisted my hiking buddy Chris into accompanying me.

Our route would be:
Day 1 – Drive from Mussourie to Taluka
Day 2 – Walk from Taluka to Osla (or Seema)
Day 3 – Walk to Har Ki Dun
Day 4 – Rest day at Har Ki Dun
Day 5 – Walk back to Osla/Seema
Day 6 – Walk to Taluka and drive to Sankri
Day 7 – Drive to Dehradun (we ended up driving to Rishikesh)

I flew out to Dehradun and spent a couple of days there. Chris joined me there and we went on to Mussourie a day later. Mussourie was a cool hill station that was obviously very popular with tourists. I didn’t love it as much people seem to do in India but we did get one really nice day of hiking in Jabarkhet Nature Reserve in the foothills of the Himalayas, in training for the real trek. We saw some great mountain views, some beautiful daisy fields, Tibetan prayer flags, and some black faced monkeys.

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Winding down…

This morning I rode through Whangarei to a little town in the north of Auckland to return the bike to the rental company. The ride was mostly over the motorway and pretty dull. I started off feeling pretty gloomy that the dream was finally over. I filled the gas tank up before I dropped it off. My suitcase had been sent over from Christchurch, so I quickly packed up.

They gave me a ride back to Auckland where I had booked a spot at Base Backpackers where I splurged and booked a private room for the next two nights. I spent the next evening and day exploring downtown Auckland. It was so much livelier on a normal weekday. There were lots of cute stores where I could buy some presents to bring back home. I also found some great cafes and Asian restaurants which were a welcome refuge from the days spent on the road subsisting on deli food and homemade sandwiches.

And that’s it. It’s done! I will post a summary of the entire ride soon.

All done!

Russell Road and Whangarei

This morning, I headed out of Paihia to Opua and caught a ferry with Fiona – a local rider – and crossed over to Russell. We got some coffee and hung out and then rode Russell Road – a beautiful twisty road winding through farmlands that you could just throw the bike around. It was a brilliant couple of hours!!

The ferry from Opua to Russell.

The bay off of Russell.

We rode to her place and got some lunch, then rode back out to another friend’s place near Whangarei.

Tomorrow would be the last day of my ride. :(

Cape Reinga and the Bay of Islands

Today I rode to the northernmost tip of New Zealand where the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean meet. The ride was pretty but not remarkable. I made good time and reached Cape Reinga before noon. From there it was a short walk to the lighthouse. A ton of tour buses must have made it there before me because the place was swarming with tourists – an odd sight since the ride itself had been so remote and unpopulated.

The tip of New Zealand where the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean meet.

The lighthouse at Cape Reinga.

From there I rode south to Paihia in the Bay of Islands. I was going to spend an extra night there to make up for doing an uber long ride. Paihia also turned out to be so touristy though that I scrapped that plan and stayed just one night.