The hardest part has yet to come...

Life sans Bluffing It, touring and the slow crushing march to reality...

It has been a few days since the journey has ended. The dust is settling and the scale and motivation of the past few months is rapidly being replaced with the need to become housed and employed. Technically homeless and unemployed in a foreign land. The drama of the written word.

Part of the journey was to seek out the 'New Zealand Smile' (and to fund raise and to see a penguin). With people who have spent time in (not prison time) New Zealand, when you utter the words 'New Zealand', a smile spreads across their face. I have seen this on many faces outside of New Zealand. In England, in Australia, in Indonesia. The faces differ but the smile is always the same. The country leaves a mark on you. You cannot help but smile. A smile that I am now a proud owner of.

A part of me wants to continue. Just keep going, exploring this glorious land, just keep going until my money is spent and the cold renders me useless. All my clothes are built for summer, the sleeping bag is in the same boat and my portable room is struggling. Bike has taken a few hits on the gravel roads but is unrelenting. Truly built for this task. And I had my counts my choice of transport to begin with. Sorry bike! (Yes I named my bike 'bike'). In the same way I had doubts about myself. The panic I felt on the very first night to those horrible bouts of self doubt at the beginning and the terrible pangs of loneliness towards the end to the bouts of paranoia to the dark places I found my mind at points after periods of isolation. And the smell. Always a bad smell lingering from some part of me. A different day, a different smell, a different source. All shit covered obstacles that needed to be dealt with. Oh, there was that brief period of time that I was convinced that I was not in full control of my bladder, that something important had been damaged. In the the end it wasn't or I've gone past not noticing. Towards the end, any care to my appearance had completely vanished, replaced by an utilitarian approach to clothing. Aesthetics became a foreign concept, as did fresh clean clothes.

Have noticed that there seems to be a disparity between the signs in Cape Reinga and Bluff. The sign pointing to Bluff reads 1456km whilst the sign pointing to Cape Reinga reads 1401km! Did NZ shrink? Has the crow found a quicker, more direct way? These questions are more pressing than any of those humdrum questions of 'What now?' and 'What am I going to do with myself?'

Distance wise, to put 4797km into perspective, as the crow flies from London, I could have cycled to Canada, Chad or Kazakhstan or from West to East in the US. Just saying.

Compared to other adventures of past, this one has been really uneventful. No run ins with drug dealers, no death threats, no near muggings at knife point, no finding love, no attempted coups, no hospital visits...then I realize, that of all the silly situations I have found myself in, this one trumps them all. Who the fuck decides that trying to run an international fundraising campaign from the back of a bicycle with no experience nor any experience of touring is 'uneventful'? That is one of the drawbacks of spending so much time alone, you find out hard to put things into perspective. There is no yard stick to measure achievements, just you and the bike. The bike doesn't know any better nor has any context to work with.

Physically I have changed. All my clothes now look too big on me. The T-shirts in the photos are a small and they now hang off me. My appetite is never appeased, people seem shocked at the quantity of food that I can consume now. Always hungry. My fitness is at crazy levels at the moment, I went for, what was intended as a small ride turned into a 75km ride. The effects of which were not even felt the next day. Mentally wise, in places, I'm stronger there. I will take on any challenge with conviction and stubbornness. Although there are still some challenges out there that still seem impossible to me. Rejection is a terrible fear and one that I need to destroy.

With gravel roads for those in motorized vehicles, top tip, if you see a person walking, a cyclist, people on horses or etc, slow the fuck down when passing! We don't have that protective veneer of metal to protect us from loose stones!

Still the hardest part was the 90 Mile Beach, in terms of cycling but the hardest part of the whole journey was the fundraising. Trying to keep everything updated, the numerous technological clusterfucks that littered the way was stressful. To the point of nearly quitting the whole fundraising side of things. I don't think the bike ride pulled in any funds but Portraits By Strangers did. You can visit the Portraits by Strangers page by heading over to www.facebook.com/portraitsbystrangers This will be ongoing and still open to donations and submissions. 

I would mention the best parts of the adventure here, but that would take up pages and pages. Everyday, the top moments of the journey changes. So to name the top moments would be impossible for me (indecision is a trait I still have not manged to overcome!) but no worries, just go back through the blog to get a rough idea. All the good and bad of the journey are apart of me and shall remain with me for as long as my mind holds out. This will not be the last journey of its kind, there will be more! Estonia to Turkey anyone?

If you are thinking of doing a fund raising campaign and need advice, just give us a shout. I can tell you the many ways of how not to do things. That I can truly say I am expert at!

Bonus posts part 1

Day 42. The march to Slope Point.

Invercargill to Slope Point

Daily total: 86.655km Running Total: 2298.39km

Left this morning completely unmotivated, dreading the next few days of riding. The sky is gray, the road is a never ending straight of asphalt! I stop at a beach. I manage to sort out places to crash for a few days time. In the distance a faint slither of blue amidst a sea of gray. I continue, passing the 4500km mark. The blue grows. The deeper into the Catlin's I go, the more the road bends and the landscape starts rolling all over the shop. The blue grows, shadows start forming for the first time. I arrive at the campsite, the sun has broken through. Only a few km from Slope Point. I wish I brought a celebratory beer. Turns out the owner of the campsite sells them cheap. The sun is out, I'm at Slope Point. I break the beer out! I have hit the most Southern part of the South Island!!! Other tourists look bemused at the overly happy cyclist in now I'll fitting clothes plying himself with booze! I get back to the campsite in time to skank a lift to go penguin spotting. An activity I had ruled out due to time and money. We sit around d in the cold, waiting, waiting,waiting. Then there's a cheer. A yellow eyed penguin appears and waddles about as comically as they do on the TV. Just pottering about being all penguin like. Its going to be a pretty,pretty cold night tonight, no worries, I have lent a hardcore winter sleeping bag for the night. Sound as! Today has been quality!

Signs...sometimes I try and work out what was going through my head when taking photos...

In the distance, a future goal: Antarctica. A mere 4800km away. 

Success!

What is missing from this photo?

Tourists are known to frequent the coast lines of NZ, with no natural predators their numbers can be overwhelming...

...here two tourists break away from the pack to gain a better vantage point...

Tourists are rewarded by their patience with a visit from a rare Yellow Eyed Penguin. The tourists let out a collective woop to alert other tourists are aware of their discovery of this tiny stranger coming close to their pack...

The Yellow Eyed Penguin goes through its slapstick routine to amuse the tourists whilst deep down hoping that a big wave will come and wash them away...

Day 43. The march from Slope Point.

Slope Point to Owaka

Daily total: 82.99km Running Total: 2381.38km

The winter sleeping bag proved difficult to escape. The warmth. The near on missed sun rise. What I saw of it from the warmth of the sleeping bag was grand. 

This was the colour of everything during the sunrise. I was just too warm in the sleeping bag to get out of the tent to busk in it's full glory.

I really should have got out of the sleeping bag sooner.

Day 44 and 45.

Owaka to Balclutha and out about in Balclutha

Daily total: 84.86km Running Total: 2466.24km

Catching up with peeps from Wellington in this town whose main source of employment lays within the meat industry. The town itself is nondescript but it borders so much beauty. Empty beaches, jutting rocks. 

Day 46. End of the road

Balclutha to Dunedin

Daily total: 98.24km Running Total: 2564.89m Overall: 4797.61

Took the scenic route along the coast, turning off at Waihola, the town of the mixed message.  You pass the the welcome to Waihola sign with the tagline 'Enjoy our lake' which was then followed by a sign that read "No hospital, no doctor, one cemetery".  I was curious to this strange juxtaposition of signage but I have also seen Deliverance.  

Enjoy.

The landscape of NZ threw in its last hand of hills at me and they did not disappoint. The first, a seemingly innocuous hill that proved to be deceptive, time and time again. The zenith always just out of reach. With the amount of climbing, my imagination told me that the views must be great but everything was obscured by a thick layer of fog. Rendering any views useless and well, seeing the other side of the road. A good time to be wearing a gray T-shirt and owing a gray backpack. 

Foggy...ok I can see the other side of the road.

The second, a misread hill on the outskirts of Dunedin, a long straight road on the map, which I read as 'flat' based on my extensive experience of long, straight roads. This wasn't not to be the case. This was the enemy of flat, a big two fingered salute to the very essence of flat. It was like New Zealand knew my journey was drawing to a close and decided to squeeze one last challenge of a hill in. I did not cave.

The last few days still held surprises, everyday was met with scenic moments that induced smiles and joyus repeated use of 'fucking hell'. This country does not let you down. Constantly bombarding the senses, each area trying to outdo the previous. The last few days have been amazing, the desire to keep going but I need to save my energy. The hardest challenge has yet to come...it will push me, it may break me but I am stubborn. I will conquer!