Gore and then fortunately turned a little bit to the northeast toward the coast at Balclutha.
I passed through Dunedin, a major university town and then on to Palmerston. I had worried Route 1 (the major road heading to the North Island and heading along the east coast) would be boring to drive but that is not the case. The land is quite hilly with lots of sweeping curves and traveling through pristine green fields (there are at least 10 sheep for every New Zealander). There are stretches where the highway has a glimpse of endless sand beaches stretching along the coast. I stopped to see the Moeriki Rocks, round boulders on the beach that are about three feet in diameter. They are formed in mudstone in a manner similar to a pearl where the rock is grown through calcification around a small piece of shell over thousands of years! After Oamaru and Timaru it was inland again towards Christchurch.
I always wondered what range my bandit had and since I got 240 kilometers using 4 of the 5 bands on the fuel gauge, I assumed it would go 300 kilometers. Wrong!!! I ran out of gas with only 270 kilometers traveled and 30 kilometers from the nearest service station. I started to try and hitch hike and a guy stopped with a truck with a cherry picker and I explained the problem. He offered to load the bike on his truck and take me down the road to the service station. How cool would that have been? He then remembered he had a two gallon gas can for a chain saw that he hadn’t added oil to yet so he gave it to me, refused payment and wished me a great trip!
I arrived in Christchurch just at 5.00 and went to the centennial pool for a mile swim.
1. Coast Above Shag Harbour 2. Moeriki Beach
3. Moeriki Rocks 4. My Gas Emergency "Savior"
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