During the night the weather depression’s associated cold front passes over and I awake to a bright morning’s sunshine. There is, however, the threat of an occasional shower at any time later throughout the oncoming day.

Soon I’m tucking into a “Rumours” Big breakfast, accompanied by another fine cup of ‘bleak ‘n woite’ coffee. Then I notice that there’s an internet caff just across the road. This is an excellent start to Thursday, December 28.

Later I shall return to the Mangamukas.
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Late evening of Thu-Dec-28

Well, during the afternoon, I finally got my ‘on-board’ video record of a run through, (up-and-over) the Mangamuka Gorge. I only had one whole non-stop go at it. I pressed the bike and my own riding skills almost to the limits, bearing in mind that, by then, we have only known each for three weeks and had covered just over a thousand miles (1,600+ km) together.

The ascent was reasonably straightforward and great fun, with plenty of traction running through onto the rear tyre; and of course very little need, if any, to apply braking (going uphill). But the descent gave me more cause for concern.

During the run down the ultra smooth tarred surface – by Kiwi standards at any rate – in certain sections was a slippery as glass. Adrenalin was rushing me towards the oncoming bends just a little too fast for my ‘average’ riding ability. The resulting right hand grab and foot stamp on the front and rear brake lever and pedal respectively made the wheels lock-up on two distinct occasions. I’ve now discovered that sliding towards a crash barrier – just a bit ‘side on’ – with locked-up wheels, simply isn’t my cuppa tea. Nevertheless, I got away with it all. These mishaps will be edited out of the final video posting. After all, some of my folks back home (Mother & Daughter-Melanie in particular) wouldn’t be too impressed if these couple of misfortunate events were put on public display!

To explain further, unlike my ST1300 Pan-European, this little Honda is not ABS assisted, which is something I must constantly keep reminding myself about, perhaps more especially when I encounter wet and/or slippery road conditions. I have indeed become too complacent over the last couple of years when grabbing and applying tons of brake, because with ABS, a locked-up wheel or two is never going to happen.

In short, I decided that I just didn’t want to push my luck any further, so it was the solitary run through the Gorge only.

‘Sensible’ riding all the way from now on, particularly as Ellen arrives from England tomorrow morning, Saturday the 30th, and for the next four weeks her life will be in my hands too.
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Later in the evening I end-up at a local disco gathering located no more than just a couple of hundred yards down the road from the Motel. The noise banged-out by the Band 'Chase the Ace' would have kept me awake in any case, so I thought '... and why not?' , as ya do.

I make a new chum called Fred – p*ssed as fart he was too. We discover that we’re more-or-less the same age – he being just a year older than me.

Over the din, Fred loudly asks me what I did for a living.
“NOTHING” I answered.
“YOU RETIRED THEN?” he replied.
“NO, JUST TIRED” I said.
[him] “TIRED OF WHAT?”
[me] “BLOODY WORKING FOR A LIVING”.
[him] “HOW CAN YOU AFFORD TO RETIRE AT FIFTY-TWO?”
[me] “DUNNO”
[him] “... YOU MUST HAVE BEEN A POLITICIAN ..??”
[me] “NO, ACTUALLY, I USED TO WORK-OUT AND FORMULATE OTHER PEOPLES’ EARLY RETIREMENT PLANS !!”

(.. just a pair of daft ol' buggers, at the end of the day! .. :o)

… and so it went on like that for a couple of hours. Nice 'nuff bloke an'all, but I was glad to get back to the unit and into bed.

So another good day – with some valuable lessons learned along the way.