Wilderness Trail – Cowboy Paradise to Kumara – 18 January 2021

 

The Saloon at Cowboy Paradise

There was no Wi-Fi or cell phone reception at Cowboy Paradise, so after our meal there were only two options; reading or writing the blog.  Bev took up the option of reading but promptly fell asleep, a state she stayed in for about 11 hours except for getting under the bed covers.  I wrote the blog until I succumbed to writing nonsense so decided to read but that didn’t help the sleepy eyes. 

 

We both had a wonderful sleep which was punctuated by thunder at some time during the night.

 

Mike, our host,  was a relative bundle of joy that morning and even offered to make a lunch that we didn’t require.  Our fellow riders who had been accommodated similarly to us generously shared  one of their lunches as they claimed they had more than enough.

 

After leaving the Lodge after a brief flat bit we spent the next 6 kilometres climbing to Kawaka Pass.  After crossing over a swing bridge we had a series of switch backs to negotiate before it was a just a meandering medium climb and then suddenly we were at the pass.  From then on it was mostly downhill with a couple of brief little climbs. 

One of several swing bridges we crossed

We stopped at an historic but crumbling old wooden weir that was used to funnel water from the river into a race  to enable high pressure sluicing.  To get there was a very short but muddy walk. As our feet were already wet we were happy to venture into the shallow water to get a better look at the remains. The best part was that on the other side of the river I sighted a couple of Whio (blue ducks) sleeping on one leg.  They are very rare and it is apparently unusual to see them. 

 

The high point a Kawaka Pass

The track took us to Kawaka settlement where there was a wigwam erected by an environmentalist who had purchased land there sometime ago. He offered billy tea and we would have stopped to have some but missed the sign at the time. 

Kawaka Settlement where there was billy tea

 After stopping for lunch at a lovely rest stop in a wetland we covered the next few kilometres quite quickly.  Close to Kumara we met a man, Nickolas who was cycle packing from Cape Reinga to Bluff.  He was quite exuberant and spoke nineteen to the dozen. We found out that he had ridden the Old Ghost Trail in a day (I think) then the next day had done the Paparoa track (92 Kms).  He said at that point he couldn’t keep going and needed to have a day off.  He was an American with NZ and Italian citizenship.  Normally he worked on boats, six months in Hawai’i and six months in Portland.  He was in decision mode while he did the cycling.  He would certainly have time to do that.

 

Lunch time

We arrived in Kumara a little after 2pm.  We stayed at the Theatre Royal Hotel (very historic) and we were told that we had been given the Seddon Suite.  This meant nothing to us until we opened the door to find this sumptuous suite with a separate bedroom and a lounge big enough to hold a party.

The lounge in the Seddon Suite

 It is thought that the NZ national anthem was written by a poet who had been a guest at this very hotel.

 

We ate at the pub and of course the meals were gargantuan but quite nice.  I had fish which was rather tasty and Bev had salmon. Bev commented that while the salmon was very nice,  the  accompaniments unfortunately lacked flavour. 

 

After the day before it felt like a really easy day and we could have easily ridden the final 28 kilometres to Greymouth. Nonetheless it was a nice experience staying at the Theatre Royal Hotel.

 

Distance covered: 35km Cycling time 2h 38m.

 

Remnant of the weir

Whio