World Tour

The first thing we noticed crossing the border into Argentina was that the overtakes were too close for comfort.

We dreamed about cycling Los Caracoles, and we finally made it. Planet Ride voted it as one of the most beautiful routes. They’re not wrong. Full of nervous excitement, we began the ride, turning the first of 27 bends, or Curvas, as they’re called out here.

We had a lovely time in Vina Del Mar. It’s a gorgeous place, definitely quite an “upmarket” touristy destination. After cycling through, we decided to stay an extra day to just wander.

We’re thankful we had some time in eastern Aus and New Zealand to give us some challenges and condition our bodies ready for these climbs.

When we first got to Santiago it was quite the culture shock! After ~ 5 months in Australia and New Zealand It felt good to have one. That’s the whole point of travelling, right?

Our route through Chile was very short but we decided to pop down to the coast at Vina Del Mar so that we could complete a full coast to coast crossing of South America.

Our flight was weird, we left Auckland on the 19th November at 18.40. We arrived in Santiago, after 11 hours flying, on the 19th November at around 13.30 🤯 Groundhog Day.

Our Auckland to Santiago flight was about 11 hours. We did get extra legroom(ish) seats which made it a bit more bearable, especially for Stew who’s 6”4.

On this day we visited the city, went to the Sky Tower and had a drink at the harbour. Chilled and our favourite way to enjoy a place, quietly wandering, in and out of cafes and shops and a nice spot for a drink.

We spent one day hunkered down in an AirBnB and the second exploring Tauranga and specifically Mount Maunganui.

Exploring Hobbiton was quite a sentimental moment because it reminded me about Stew inviting me on the trip and sharing his dream with me.

Well, we have done a proper injustice catching this day in photos because we stayed with a Warmshowers and had an absolutely cracking time!

Meet Kerry! Our brilliant Warmshowers host in Turangi. He was super patient with us because we arrived late after there was a car crash and a closed road; the only route we could take without a 40 mile detour.

We left Wellington and rolled onto a cycle path that took us a FULL 50 miles all the way to Otaki! We were both amazed and thrilled! It’s always nice to be off the roadside and along the peaceful paths.

Just outside of Wellington we had three friends from home in Shrewsbury. Roy who we met for dinner on our touristy day around Wellington and Graeme and Michelle who kindly hosted us for quite a few nights!

We were supposed to ride Blenheim to Picton and grab a ferry in one day, but we didn’t book our ferry in time so we had to spend a night in Picton instead.

The bike ride to Kaikoura was absolutely gorgeous. We were cycling along the east coast and the colour of the water was postcard perfect blue.

The south island just keeps on giving. I’ve compared New Zealand to the Scottish Highands a few times and I stand by that, but the Scottish Highlands are tiny in comparison.

Getting Stew to attach my DIY ‘Just Married’ sign to his bike wasn’t the easiest task I’ve had, but he did eventually agree to attach it for one bike ride only 😋

I don’t even know how to write a post about Sean and Vee that does justice to how special they are to us: two people who became so instrumental in our cycling adventure and marriage.

Stew and I have been following Cheryl for YEARS. We watched as she travelled New Zealand in her van and hoped to meet her one day.

And we did it – just us, Sean (our celebrant), his wife, Vee (a witness), and Chris (witnesses and photographer) – we eloped in New Zealand.

A quick photo tour of our time in Christchurch

We went out for dinner in Springfield and I’m pretty sure it made me really sick and our wedding was just days away 😫