Interlude in Palmerston North

We arrived earlier this afternoon and have settled in to a very comfortable B&B in the south west of Palmerston North.

Dinner is at home for a change, eating up food we have been carrying for a couple of days. We have an almost three week interlude in front of use. Too long, but Sau Keng has work commitments so we have a drastic change of lifestyle for a while. Today is Friday, we will spend the weekend here, fly to Christchurch, work there for two weeks, fly back to Palmerston North for the weekend, where I will stay while Sau Keng returns to Christchurch for three more days. We should be on the road again on the 28th.

Saturday, our first rest day for awhile. Sau Keng works while I write this blog - it's been several days since I published an installment and Sau Keng is getting comments from our readers! I'm proud of this blog, but it takes effort and time, I don't write quickly nor get the words right easily. At midday we do a bit of shopping and pick up our 'Christchurch' clothes which Marica has brought down here for us and left with her brother in law, Allen (many thanks). We have dinner with Peter Chan (thanks Peter) Back home Sau Keng continues watching a Netflix series, Fool me once, that she started last night and gets through a couple more episodes.

Sunday. A busy social day. Breakfast with Peter, who takes us to the Victoria esplanade. This is a lovely place, sort of a forest botanical garden with paths throughout, big enough to get lost in. Peter takes us to an aviary, one of the birds is a cockatoo, named "Buds", it comes up to the netting and says clearly "I want a scratch" So I gently scratch it's head and neck for a couple of minutes. It's not enough, as soon as I stop Buds asks for more. I oblige then pass over to the next visitor. She is not so trusting and uses a stick instead of a finger. Thanks again Peter, this was a lovely place to bring us.

Back home and it's time to go out again, this time with my workmate Joe, to a dim sum restaurant for lunch. It's a great choice by Joe, we have been starved of Chinese food so far on this trip. We eat, chat and eat some more then Joe brings us home again and we get on our bikes to explore. Thanks again Joe.

A very good path takes us across the river and out to Massey university, it's a very big campus and feels strange to me to be so isolated and self contained. I am used to Auckland University, which is much more tangled with the city.

The paths along the river are great and we explore Victoria esplanade again. Back beside the river we ride north, back to the point where we left the path on Friday. Finally head home through the city, stopping at K-Mart for Sau Keng to buy a jersey fit for her work in Christchurch. As we pull up I hear a "Twang" from my bike and investigate. A broken spoke waves from the side of my rear wheel. Another is wrapped around the hub. I check the tension on the spokes and find another one broken, but sitting nicely in place. This is not good. I ride home gently and cautiously.

In the evening we complete our packing, tomorrow we ride across the city to Allen, leave the bikes there and fly to Christchurch. I complete two more blog posts and Sau Keng finishes the last of her presentation - and two more episodes on Netflix. We rode almost 30 kilometers this afternoon and it felt short and easy :-) A very good day.