Day 54-55: Biking around Takaka, Motupipi, and Abel Tasman

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present, again, our new rides!

 We didn't buy them, but rented them from the local bike shop, The Quiet Revolution.  We have discovered that there are so many good mountain biking tracks in the area, we figured we'd give them a try.  The price wasn't cheap (2 days is $240 NZ) but we've been saving so much money staying in the yurt for free, we thought we'd splurge.

Was it worth it?

 I'd say no, but that last picture would tell you I was lying.

 Before that picture, we did a small practice run at Payne's Ford, where we have been running, and then up to the Rameka Gorge, where we went hiking to Abel.

 Great Expectations is the name of the trail we biked up and down.  It's the finished trail going up and down this particular value.  The unfinished trail, The Odyssey, is the trail we ran up with Maddie, and then later hiked up on our way into Abel Tasman.

On our first day we though we had packed enough provisions, but sadly, didn't bring enough water for how hot it was.  (Takaka has been relatively cool, even for summer, until today).  Once we reached the top of Great Expectations, we turned around, biked down, had a break, and then headed to Motupipi Hill.

Motupipi Hill is a privately held block of land, but the owners have let it be developed into a bit of a hiking and biking track.  It's not particularly hard or steep, but it extremely well built, graded, and is what mountain bikers would call "very flowy".  This means lots of banked turns, rolling hills, and a great sense of just biking.

The following day, more biking around Abel.  We remembered to bring extra food and water, and resultingly got a lot more distance in.  Until we saw this:

And decided it was time to head home.  Well, that and we had been mountain biking for 12 hours in the previous 36, and were getting pretty tired.  This view:

was the same as when we hiked the same trail.  But still great to see.

Aren't we bad ass looking?

Molly is pleased with herself, and her first two days of mountain biking.

It's a long down hill, but somebody's got to do it.

From the bottom, looking up.

And lastly, I'll leave you with some recipes of snacks we've been devouring here.  Wendy and Carol both love to bake, so we've been eating a lot of all of these at tea time.