Bikepacking the South Island of New Zealand | Rebecca Gross

Ever wanted to cycle the South Island of New Zealand?

Rebecca Gross shares an honest update from her time bikepacking the South Island. It was a bikepacking trip shaped by relentless rain and freezing summer temperatures. This led to long days of riding chasing weather windows that would allow for side quests such as hiking around Mount Cook.  From Te Araroa sections and west coast gravel to the high mountains around Mount Cook, the final days of riding saw her and partner Javi ride into Paradise near Queenstown.

A must listen if cycling in New Zealand on the South Island is on your own bucket list. 

Be sure to give Rebecca a follow via her instagram - @Rebecca_Grb

Head over to Old Man Mountain and checkout the Manzanita Cradle 

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Hello everybody, Bella Malloy here, host of Seek Travel Ride. Welcome to another midweek episode where I am stoking your fire for bike travel adventures. This week I'm super excited because I'm sharing another update from our intrepid adventurer Rebecca Gross. Many of you know will many of you will know we've been tracking Rebecca's adventures since she left her home in Austria almost one year ago. Her plan was to travel east with her partner Harvey to the Pamirs, and then they got there and then kept going. And this update is giving us all the details on their time on the South Island of New Zealand. I'm super excited for this. Listeners of the show will know that I'm a huge fan of New Zealand as a country full stop, and so I especially love hearing people talk about their time there. Listeners, if you can hear that my voice is a bit croaked, it's because unfortunately I'm a bit under the weather at the moment, so there's no time for riding bikes and adventures for me at present, but a lot of wonderlust, as always. And there's nothing like not feeling well to get me thinking about where I might want to go on my own adventure. I actually posed this as a question on Instagram just recently, and I just said, where is your next bike adventure going to take you? And I got a fair few responses, so I want to shout a few of them out now here. First one is from Sean underscore Eric underscore Martin, and you have said Death Valley. So that's gonna be a mega adventure there, some incredible scenery to be had. Biking the blue marble. That's you, Ted. Hello. Uh you've said Japan. I've got to say that's a country I especially want to go to. I think uh the scenery, the culture, and of course the food has got me excited about a trip there. I have Where is Marcello? And you have said Faroe Islands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, a scandy tour. Oh Marcelo, I'm always excited to hear about your adventures there. I talk about it so much, we actually do need to schedule in for a proper podcast session. Um but yeah, wow, some totally different scenery there and the Faroe Islands, you're preparing yourself for some nice windy weather too, no doubt. I have Matt Benson93, you have said India. Oh wow, lots of cultural diversity coming your way there. I then have Orangutan, and you have said Sarawak Borneo. Borneo, listeners, is somewhere I don't really know too much about, so I'm excited to see that one play out for you. I then have previous podcast guest, Jacob Ashton, otherwise known as occasional underscore bikepacker on Instagram, and you have said Arkansas to race Doom. Ooh, you had an incredible race there last year. In fact, was Doom your first ultra cycling race? Listeners, if you haven't listened to Jacob's episodes before, he's someone who's literally gone all over the world for many, many years, and now he's turned his mind to ultra races, which is incredible. I actually think potentially, I think uh Saima, Saima.bikes, I think another previous guest, I have a feeling he's doing Doom as well. So you might see each other on the start line. Swap some world travel stories. I then have Finn.deedman, and you have said Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Oh wow. There is so much diversity ahead of you there in Central Asia. You've got the mega Silk Road cities going through Uzbekistan, and then oh wow, like the high mountain passes of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, like the Pamirs and potentially the Tian Shan Mountains as well. Whoa! Wow, incredible stuff ahead of you. And then lastly, I have Begit from Germany. Hello, you said I don't know. I want to go to so many places. I think my fear is coming back, and I feel so lazy. Oh, it's nothing like being in the winter there in northern Germany to have a bit of the blues hit as well, in terms of you know, not feeling like you can go anywhere on your bike. But hopefully, like me currently here, a little bit sick, you're you've got your mind to where you want to go to. And I think sometimes just choosing somewhere, even if it's a a few months ahead, and saying, That's it, I'm gonna go here, then, and then it gives you something to focus on and get excited about. I'm certainly excited about my future adventures listeners. I want to actually explore a lot more of France, to be honest with you. There's so many places I haven't actually been to in regions there that I definitely want to take my bike on. And something a little bit different. Last year I got myself a Brompton bike, and I actually want to use it for some shorter tours. I've seen people on YouTube do this, and I think I reckon I could give it a go. Pack light and travel far on my little folding bike, use it for its flexibility of getting me to cities really quickly on the trains and then just take off for a few days. So uh different types of adventures ahead for me. Something else I wanted to shout out as well before we get to Rebecca's updates was the great events that are happening in our amazing community. Now I have had some previous guests of the show put together some events. A few weeks ago I shared an episode with Claire Sharp from Bristol, who hosts the Bristol Rally, and I mean her event has sold out. So the popularity for these type of events is huge. Sirtia Potti with her Snailblazers events is looking to go exactly the same well way. And then I've got Melanie Shout. I featured her just over a year ago in her adventures through South America, and she uh hosts an event in Austria called The Wild Escape, and their first one has sold out as well, which is incredible, and it looks like they're maybe thinking of holding another event, so keep your eyes peeled on that. And something that has just dropped recently is uh our show sponsors, Old Man Mountain, they've teamed up with some huge bike brands, and they are putting together a bike packing campo, which is going to follow Sea Otter over there in the US. So it's from April the 16th to the 19th. They've got an amazing campsite set up. They've got three days, they're gonna have movies, drinks, rides, talks, after parties, the lot. Yeah, so get yourself onto oldmanmountain.com. There's details about the bikepacking camp out there. I love that these events are popping up more and more. And I know another one in Europe is called Pedaleo. It has my mind thinking maybe I need to do a seek travel ride one. Uh I'd love to. I think there's a lot of organizing that goes into it as well. But let me know if that's something that might interest you in Europe. Let me know. Maybe we can see how logistically we could look to make it happen. Okay, after all of that, now it's time to hear about the South Island of New Zealand. Take it away, Rebecca.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Today it's time for the update from the South Island of New Zealand. This part of New Zealand was definitely mentally and physically so much more challenging. On the one hand, there was just a lot of rain, headwind, and these annoying sand flies, but luckily there were also massive mountain ranges. The biggest diversity in landscapes I have seen nowhere else, and there were also so many kind strangers offering their help. After two weeks on the North Island, we left Wellington. It was actually really bad weather, but then we arrived in Picton and the sun was shining. At this point we didn't know that it wouldn't last for long, this good weather. We cycled again the TA route on the South Island, which follows actually the west coast of the island, but we only followed it until Wanaka. From there on we did different trails, and we also did a lot of detours on the way. So the first detour was the Abel Tasman National Park where we went hiking, we had a beautiful camp spot at the beach, and it was really cool because there were some natural pools with crystal clear but also freezing water in the middle of the jungle. We really really enjoyed our stay there. In terms of cycling, I would always choose the North Island over the South Island. Just because on the South Island it's a lot of cycling on the one and only highway on the west coast, and it can get pretty busy. The camper vans are really annoying because somehow people don't realize how big they are with their camper van. And another type of car is super annoying and pretty dangerous. It's the trucks who are towing a boat. A lot of cars have a boat in the back, and the car drivers they are really friendly and respectful, but somehow they keep forgetting about their boat. And with the boat, it was sometimes a pretty close call and a bit dangerous. But anyway, it was not only the highway. We also had some very beautiful trails, and I think the most beautiful one, at least for me, was the West Coast Wilderness Trail, which was just stunning. It was again a really good gravel road. It was going through dense forest, through rainforest jungle, and on top we had some really beautiful mountain views. And the mountain views, they are something very special of the South Island. With every kilometer we cycled further south, the landscape kept changing, and the mountains just got higher and higher, and we had some really beautiful views on the way. But because of a lot of heavy rain and also some weather warnings because of the rain, we had to cycle a lot every day. It was an average of around 120 kilometers every single day, and we did this probably three or four days in a row, and right after a long cycling day, we went straight to a hike. We just wanted to see as much as possible when it was not raining, so we just had to push really, really hard. So after this pushing for three or four days, then the amazing hikes, usually on the way back of the hike, the weather already changed. So it was actually not only coincidence that the weather was good when we were on a hike, it was also a lot of effort, and that's how we could be on top of a mountain or at a really beautiful lookout for glaciers on a sunny day. And after all this pushing, we always had like two or three days off because of the rain, so we couldn't cycle further and could rest a bit. So our rhythm in cycling was very, very different than what we would normally do, or how many rest days we would normally have. So we had to adjust a bit uh to the weather. The west coast was as beautiful as everyone told us, but with the weather being slightly better on the east coast, we were really looking forward to cycle over the mountain range and see the other side of the mountains, and wanted to enjoy the good weather. So in Wanaka we did a really beautiful hike, it was amazing. We had some tough days before, had to cycle over a mountain pass, and then we did this super steep hike, but it was so rewarding because on top we were overlooking snow cape peaks and blue lakes, and we were there alone. And what was also really cool in Wanaka is that we got hosted by two kind strangers, Peter and Sean. Reached out to Harvey actually the moment when we arrived already in New Zealand, and they were following our journey through Facebook, and they uh wrote a message to Harvey asking if we would pass by Wanaka and if we want to stay with them. And this was not the only message we received. We got a lot of invitations from strangers who offered that we could stay with them or offered their help. But unfortunately, they were most of them were in Christchurch and we just wouldn't go there. But it was really cool to see the people are following us, that they care about us, although they have no idea who we are. It was also cool knowing that we are inspiring some people. So after this wonderful stay in Wanaka, we actually left the TA route and cycled over to the Alps to Ocean Trail. We had to cycle over a mountain pass and it was raining again. But the forecast was promising. We thought it's the actually the last day of rain for the next two weeks, so we pushed through the rain thinking that the next days everything can get dry and we can enjoy some sun. But luckily, we didn't know that we would only have two days of sun and then a whole week of rain. But we had a plan and a big hike coming. The beginning of the Alps to Ocean Trail is nothing less than the Mount Cook village. So we made the effort and cycled all the way up the valley, not knowing if these low-hanging clouds would actually clear up, but it was magic. The clouds cleared up only on one specific spot in the sky. The only thing that came out of the clouds was Mount Cook. It was so so special. The next day was then supposed to be the only sunny day, and so we knew we had to squeeze in a hike to be able to enjoy the mountains, and we were pretty lucky because only maybe one hour in the hike the clouds cleared up, and what we saw was so beautiful. There were massive zarachs, we saw huge glaciers and Mount Cook itself with the dramatic ridges. It was just stunning. New Zealand is just so fascinating because you just never know which landscape would come next. Such a diversity of landscape just left me speechless. You never know if you are in Hawaii or in Iceland or even in Nepal. It's it's beautiful. And so this day we were really happy that we made the effort to do this exhausting hike, and we cycled down to the coast uh through some very beautiful trails along some lakes. There were some single trails along the ridge line and along the lakes. It was really cool, a bit stressful for me and mentally, but it was it was beautiful. Finally, some proper trails. We also had some funny river crossings. Some parts of the trail were actually closed because of flooding, but we just were so sick of the main road, and we wanted to stick to the trail, and we thought, how bad could it be? And it was really bad. There were there was one huge river, and we had to cross it like three or four times, and with every crossing, the river just got deeper until the water was almost uh up to our hips, and I just did not like it. We didn't have these river crossings in Mongolia, they were actually fine in Mongolia, but Javi enjoyed this adventure a lot. He said, Finally, we have some deep river crossings and can talk with all the people who had the river crossings in Mongolia. So when we reached the coast, we saw the little penguins in the night, which was a really cool experience, and we also had another rest day because of rain, of course, and the rain just didn't stop. And at this point, we were pretty unlucky because at some point we had to get to Queenstown, and we had to cycle over a mountain pass, there was just no other way, and the rain wouldn't stop for days, so it just didn't matter how long we would wait, we just have to cycle in the rain, and that's what we did. The motivation actually got lower and lower because we were just so wet every single day, nothing could dry, and on top of that, the temperatures were freezing. We just couldn't believe that we are in summer. On a day we we did not even have 10 degrees, it was more like three or four degrees with such a strong headwind with heavy rain and everything was wet, all of our clothes and we were just shaking because it was so so cold. That's just not how we imagined summer here, and we just couldn't bring up any motivation anymore. But also with zero motivation, we kept going. We just had to reach Queenstown. And once we reached Queenstown, the weather got actually better. We couldn't believe our eyes. We had sun, warm temperatures, and summer days. The last two days we had for cycling here in New Zealand, and we reached the city a bit early, so we thought it's time for another detour, and that's how we ended up in paradise. The road to paradise is actually shit. I did not like it. Although the name sounds so beautiful, I expected a lot, but the road is just so so hilly. I do not mind any mountain pass. I love cycling uphill, but I hate hills, endless hills, going up, going down, and we had this here in New Zealand almost every single day. It was so exhausting, and of course there was a gravel road, it was so dusty because there were a lot of cars, and after zero motivation with the rain, then with this bad road, I didn't know if the idea going to paradise would be a good one, but it It was it was the best decision we made. The scenery was just from another word. Beautiful mountain ranges, glaciers, and we had the most perfect camp spot. Normally we always sleep with the overfly of the tent because we never know if it's raining. Normally it's really cold. We it seems that we just never have perfect weather for sleeping without the overfly. But once we reach this camp spot, we knew today is the day, and we want to enjoy the stars while we are in the tent. So that's exactly what we did. And we had this amazing sky with so many stars, and it was it was mind-blowing. It was such a beautiful night, and the morning was just as perfect as the as the night was. It was our last day in paradise, and we enjoyed a proper breakfast. We had a slow morning, nobody was there. We expected a lot of tourists coming in in the morning, but nobody came. We were alone in paradise, and it was such a perfect ending to our stay in New Zealand.

SPEAKER_00 25:05

Oh Rebecca, there's so much for me to get into here. You know I always get super excited hearing your updates, and it's interesting to hear how the South Island of New Zealand went to you compared to the north. It seemed like the weather was a constant theme, and look, I've got to tell you, like, for you and Harvey, hats off to you, landing in New Zealand in what you perceive is going to be beautiful summer weather, and then being hit with some of the worst rain events that New Zealand has actually seen in recent time, and freezing cold, to have to deal with that and long days and being camped and feeling like you're just wet and soggy and freezing day in, day out, that has to take such a mental toll. So I can totally understand how it probably overshadowed some of your time there in the South Island. And yeah, it's just th I mean we can't control the weather, can we? We are sort of it is what it's going to be, it is what it is, and I think hats off to you both for just doing what you did. Like those long days on the bikes to do the long hikes in the places that you wanted to be in, like I can only imagine how energy sapping it must have been. But also knowing both of you now through these updates, I can also tell how you would have been so motivated to see the places in the sunshine. So I can understand about that. I also want to spend some time talking about your experience there with the traffic, because listeners, this has actually come up with every guest that I have spoken to about New Zealand, and often these conversations actually happen offline and not actually in the podcast. But New Zealand has unfortunately come up as a place that for cycling, especially more on the road, not on the off-road trails. The off-road trails are mega. I mean, hearing Rebecca's updates, it sounds exactly that. But riding on the road there doesn't sound like it's at all a pleasant experience. And New Zealand has, oddly enough for me, come up as to be, it feels like one of the places where people have felt most vulnerable on the roads with a lot of close passes. And exactly what Rebecca was talking about there as well. It might not be so much the driver's ignorance or attitudes towards cyclists, but it's actually there's a lot of people towing caravans or in camper vans or towing boats who don't really have an understanding of how wide their vehicles are, how much space they need to leave as well. It's come up with many guests, and I've seen it recently online from a number of people in New Zealand as well, and that seems to have been Rebecca's experience too. A lot of people have told me that New Zealand's fantastic for riding bikes as long as you're not on a road, and it makes me sad to think that the road experience on there is not so great. Rebecca was talking about paradise and the road to paradise, and I've got to say, I got married in New Zealand. I had my honeymoon in Queenstown with my husband, and we didn't have bikes with us that day, but I remember we took the drive to paradise and did an incredible hike there, and all along I was thinking, oh my gosh, I want to come back and ride this road. And A, it's funny that Rebecca didn't enjoy that because of the hilly terrain. I had a chuckle at that, but then also thinking, I don't know that I will go there and ride the asphalt or the roads in New Zealand. I don't think that I enjoy sort of that feeling of surviving with the cars. And um yeah, it's a little bit of a downer for me thinking about that. But the off-road trails sound absolutely magnificent, and I saw the footage of this play out on your Instagram page, Rebecca, and it looked incredible, beyond words, incredible. I had a little chuckle when you were saying how riding along the the sort of ridge lines was a little bit interesting for you mentally, and oh my goodness, I would be exactly the same. I've seen the single track that sort of curves around the sort of mountain ridges there, and you know, I'm an anxious person, so I'm constantly thinking if I slip the wrong way, I'm gonna just tumble down. And I imagine that's possibly what you're talking about. But the infrastructure on the off-road trails for New Zealand looks absolutely mega and amazing. And the Kiwis themselves, it sounds like you had some amazing hosts. I love that you had lots of messages from people who've been tracking your story and wanting to host you as well. That's such an amazing, you know, experience to be able to share with people to swap stories and that hospitality that sort of followed you all the way around to the other side of the world. And then I want to talk about Mount Cook. I got married at Mount Cook on the Tasman Glacier, so it's a place that's very near and dear to me. Funnily enough, my very first time in New Zealand, we arrived at Mount Cook Village and saw Mount Cook for all of about five minutes, and then that was it. And the entire week was a bit like you and Harvey, except we weren't riding bikes, and so we never saw the mountains, we just saw low-hanging cloud. So I'm so stoked that you had a day where you had incredible weather as well to see Mount Cook in all its glory. It's a proper, proper mountain, and those of us who might be from Australia or from the Southern Hemisphere, we don't have these big stark mountains like you know, our access to them like people in, you know, uh the Europe or the US might have. And so to see a proper mountaineering mountain like Mount Cook in that pristine scenery is something else. I think the other thing with New Zealand is it just feels like nature is at a hundred percent, and you are right, there's so much diversity to be enjoyed there as well. And I mean we're talking about the scenery, but let's talk about the bird life too. Like it is incredible, and it's such a beautiful place. So, yeah, maybe not to ride bikes on an asphalt road, but certainly to enjoy those off-road trails and also the hiking there as well. So, yeah, I absolutely loved your update, Rebecca. The river crossing sounded pretty dicey. Um I'll be honest with you, I've got my thoughts on taking on river crossings, especially when a trail is closed. But I'm glad you both survived it. And listeners, uh Rebecca's final stop on this amazing adventure is Tasmania. These updates are a little bit behind, so as this episode goes out, Rebecca will have actually probably finished her adventure. So we have another update to look forward to from Tasmania to hear how that trip went. Yeah, it's incredible to think of where you've ridden to from Austria. And also, I have some exciting news because someone reached out to me that I met at my London live show, uh, Milica, and she's been inspired by your journey, Rebecca, and she's actually going to be taking her own bike adventure through Europe starting in a couple of months. And listeners, we're going to be following her journey along as well. So it almost feels a bit full circle. Someone listening to this pod got inspired to do a huge adventure, and then someone has listened to that huge adventure and now is inspired to do their journey. And it's always got me wondering how many people tune into the show and do that. And I always love hearing about those stories. So if you haven't done so already, but you've tuned into this pod and been inspired to take your own adventure, please get in touch with me. I would love to hear all about it. And of course, thank you so much, Rebecca. Alright, listeners, now it's time for me to do my favourite part of the show, which is to shout out you incredible Dead Set Legends of Superfans who've bought me some virtual coffees. These coffees really do keep the podcast rolling, and this week I would like to shout out Mark Williams, and you have said, Hi Bella, I love the show. I'm a 65-year-old guy, still loving the cycling. Not crossing continents, but I have done the Torino Nice Rally, Las Montanas Vasius, and Vuelta Vasco, amongst others, since retiring. Something that your guest Tomas said about living your life in your twenties hit hard for me. I have no regrets, but I remember reading Jupiter Travels repeatedly and thinking, I wish I could do that. Turns out that I should have. Well, Mark, thanks so much for buying me some coffees. And listeners, I actually uh got in Mark got in touch with me and sent me a link to a YouTube film which showcased his Torino Nice rally experience, which looked incredible. And can I just say, Mark, don't look back with FOMO. Like you are doing things now, and it sounds like you've had some incredible adventures, and I know that future adventures are ahead of you too. So I love hearing about those stories, and thank you so much for supporting me and the pod. Next I have Stephen Toba, and you have said thanks for keeping my aging brain full of ideas and dreams to continue to explore the planet by bike, and for making my less than exciting training rides around the Calgary area much more interesting. I don't listen to podcasts when I'm touring as there's so much going on, but with your podcast, it doesn't matter which routine training route I do, my mind is carried away to faraway places. Oh, thank you so much, Stephen. And in fact, you and I have swapped emails as well, and you have done some incredible adventures yourself. I do love that you have tuned into the podcast to, I guess, take away the mundane of a familiar training route, and I'm sure you're listening to it and getting inspired for more adventures to come. Thanks so much for supporting me and the pod. And listeners, if you want to be like Mark Williams and Stephen Tober, show that you're a true super fan, you can head to buymeacoffee.com forward slash seek travel ride. Buy me some virtual coffees, but let me know what is it that you are loving about this podcast and where is your next bike adventure going to take you. And until the next episode, I'm Bella Malloy. Thanks for listening.