Wanaka to Arrowtown

We spent monday unexpectedly in Wanaka as I woke up feeling very ill. I spent the whole of monday in bed but today I felt I could follow Vanessa up the Crown Range all the way into Arrowtown. We left Wanaka at around 10.00 in beautiful weather. The first 25 km to Cardrona are not too bad, although it is all uphill. We had a coffee and a dutch apple pie and gave Ella some time to run in the restaurant´s garden before we set off for the second and last ascent.

The road started climbing steeper and steeper but it is still pretty feasible to keep going. The scenery is spectacular and if the firat part of the ascent reminded us of Spain, after Cardrona we felt as if we were in Patagonia. The heat was getting to us and the last 4 km are very hard. We had to get off our bikes when there was about 1 km left. Pushing the bikes up the steep hill in this heat was hard work but once again we made it and the views over the mountains, valley and Queenstown are stunning.

We were told the descent was a bit dangerous so I let Vanessa have a head-start. She does not tend to take unnecessary risks but I rather stayed behind just in case. The first part of the descent is awesome: very steep and open bends where I hardly needed to brake. I could feel the trolley going from side to side though so I had to slow down...I was going at almost 80km/h...not a good idea when you are towing a trolley of 50 kg.

The second part of the descent is much more dangerous with a lot of 180 degree bends, Tour de France-style. I underestimated the weight of the trolley and when I was almost at the bottom of the descent all of a sudden I felt the trolley coming next to me and it took me off the road. I slammed on the tarmac, my thigh hit the handle bars and the trolley slammed into my knee after doing a 360. My handle bar came off, my brake-handle is completely bent, the leather cover of the saddle has come off and the trolley is completely scratched on one side. I got up, checked my injuries but I was fine, no bones broken today. I should have slowed down in those 180 bends.

Anyway, we got to Arrowtown where we took a long hot shower and went to bed early after a very exciting day and 38 km of uphill!