On the 2nd of November I boarded a airplane in Boise Idaho and landed in Auckland on November 4th, love that worldwide date line. Air New Zealand made the 23 hour journey all most nice, however at 73 journeys of that size are arduous on the physique. The journey began from Christchurch on the south island and ended 19 driving days later in Auckland. This was my second Edelweiss tour, the primary was Iceland in July 2022. These excursions are top notch with a number of bike in glorious form, on each journeys mine was a R1250GS, skilled guides, good inns and eateries, nicely although out routes and relying on the tour nice sight seeing alongside the way in which. The Journey: 2023 – New Zealand by Motorbike / Official Guides Weblog of Journey: NSZ 2302 New Zealand Tour / Hyperlink to 2022 Iceland Tour

As you possibly can see when you comply with both NZ hyperlink, this was a tour that noticed loads of the New Zealand driving each the north and south islands. In all of the 21 day tour is a bit over 3,200 driving miles. The roads have been 98% paved, the two% was development and chip sealing. Official velocity limits are 100KM and under. Pace indicators ending in zero are the official restrict, indicators ending in 5 are solutions and are yellow. Normally the NZ drives are essentially the most courteous I’ve ever encountered, I feel street rage is sort of unknown, and dashing is uncommon and the native police take dashing severely. There are principally round-a-bouts, some nicely designed and a few utterly bizarre with as much as six exits. The roads we rode, principally secondary are slender, twisting and have extra turns per mile than any you’ll encounter out aspect of the Alps or Tail of the Dragon. I reside in Idaho and journey mountain street on a regular basis they’re freeways in comparison with a few of these. Blind corners are frequent! Hazards, most RV (that are pushed principally by vacationer) as they are often doing 10 kph round a blind nook, suppose driving right into a wall, farm tools, cattle (principally sheep), rocks on the street, street harm on account of earth quake or flooding. On our tour we had 4 rain days, three of them it actually got here down at occasions, so have an excellent rain go well with or water proof gear. Anticipate the roads to get slick and restricted visibility.

Tour Group: We had 15 visitor and three information for the primary 14 days and 5 visitor and two information for the final 7. The guides have been all Germen – Austrian and quite a few the company have been additionally from Europe. The remainder of us have been from the USA this time which I assume was uncommon as previous excursions have principally been from Europe and the UK. The group naturally broke down into two driving kinds. I’ll check with them because the Racers and the Tourers. The racers have been principally within the RIDE, tended to take the corners quicker and did not appear to be all that interested by being vacationer. The Tourers, tended to need to journey slower and needed to cease for footage, go to locations of curiosity and never move the automobile, truck or RV in entrance simply since you might. By the way in which passing with a bunch of eight riders on these roads is Russian roulette in my opinions. If you have not guessed but, I used to be a staunch member of the Tourers.

Sightseeing / Using Stability: Of the 2 excursions I’ve taken with Edelweiss I feel the Iceland tour received the steadiness higher, we rode between issues to see every day. In NZ we rode and sometimes stopped to have a look at issues many day. Some days could possibly be outlined as nice roads with espresso stops at 10:30, lunch at 12:30, espresso cease at 15:00 and resort between 17:00 & 18:00 with dinner at 19:30. I felt we rode by quite a few locations that I might have stopped on a self guided journey. Do not get me mistaken we did cease and do some actually attention-grabbing issues, I might identical to to have ridden a bit much less and seen a bit extra.

The northern extension had 5 visitor (four racers & me). After a day of chasing tail lights in a heavy rain, I went to the information and mentioned I needed to modify to self-guiding which is at all times an possibility. My bike was geared up with a GPS (Garmin XT) and the deliberate routes. I additionally had the resort deal with which if the GPS died might with Google Maps get me to my mattress for the night time. Whereas I rode just like the NZ drive and stopped for extra footage and at time simply to go searching and discuss to individuals, the remainder of the journey I arrived inside + or – 10 minutes of the group, typically earlier than. Why, I did not take 30 minute espresso / nicotine breaks and far shorter lunches. Usually I bumped into the group, or extra doubtless they drove by me four or 5 occasions a day as we have been doing the identical route. They have been happier to not be ready for me and I did not really feel the stress of racing to maintain up. All future excursions my bike can have a GPS, realizing the place you’re going and the subsequent end up of a round-a-bout make a enormous distinction. Talking of excursions, my subsequent is Scotland in August 2024.

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Rental Bikes in New Zealand since 1987
That is one other glorious possibility if you wish to journey in New Zealand – They supplied the bikes for the Edelweiss tour!