Announcements

**saralou** · #1 18 Mar 2018

Arriving to Mike’s home he had one side of the garage open for us, cold

s ready, and he cooked us up a fantastic

can chicken dinner. We went over the south island map with him as well and he added quite a few local aid bits! We also booked our ferry tickets today. We had to go with 3 days from now in order to not have to go at 9 am or 8 pm. We booked with Blue bridge as they allow 2 motorbikes to be booked on one reservation, they had a 130 pm opening for the 3.5 hour crossing as opposed to 9 am or 5 pm), and it was 50$ cheaper. They are north sea ferries and not as nice as the ones run by the competition Inter-island.

North Island NZ 1-93 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

North Island NZ 1-94 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

It is not very nice out today so for our tour in the city Mike took us in the car. We headed into Wellington city and visited the Te Papa national museum, lunched on the waterfront at Mac’s, then drove over to visit the NZ first world war memorial and museum. We headed back to Mike’s so Sara could cook us up dinner.

North Island NZ 1-95 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

Giant Squid!

IMG_1954 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #2 18 Mar 2018

It is supposed to be a much nicer day today and we set out on the bikes just after 9.

FILE2598 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

Leaving Porirua we did take the motorway until Johnsonville and then turned off onto the Ohairu Valley Road.. This is a very narrow and curvy road thru farm lands. We took a detour off to visit Makara beach.

FILE2607 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

IMG_1964 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

North Island NZ 1-96 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #3 19 Mar 2018

Next we crossed over the west of the suburbs to climb the steep road to the “wind turbine” lookout. This has a panoramic view over the city from the west.

IMG_1967 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

North Island NZ 1-97 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

North Island NZ 1-98 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #4 19 Mar 2018

From here we rode down to the sea on Happy Valley Road and to Owhiro bay. The road here skirts the seaside and ends at the airport. Here we had a great lunch on the deck of the Spruce Goose and watched the planes take off and land.

FILE2657 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

FILE2669 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

When you continue on the coast road you actually ride under the runways and along the coast with views of the harbor.

North Island NZ 1-99 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #5 19 Mar 2018

There is a steep and narrow switch back road to the lookout at Mount Victoria.

North Island NZ 1-101 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

North Island NZ 1-100 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

When we came back from enjoying the view Lulu would not start! Now when we arrived back from Vietnam there was a starting issue, but since then the bike started but there was a delay of a second when the starter was pushed. For the last 2 days it did not seem to be running “normally” or at least seemed to lack power, but the voltage meter was 14.

We tried to jump the bike-no, we swapped out the battery from the 800-no, we jumped it with the new battery and started. So either the regulators or the stator! We luckily were less than 5 km and mostly downhill to get to Mikes shop Boyle Kawasaki. Glad it did not die on the hill like it did in Quito when I broke my toe!

Screen Shot 2018-01-23 at 22.27.07 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

Screen Shot 2018-01-23 at 22.27.41 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

What nice guys. They immediately offered help, tested the battery (all good), offered to fix the bike, offered us a trailer….and

. In the end Dan and Mike rode back home and picked up Mikes car and trailer and then came back for Lulu and Sara.

IMG_1971 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #6 19 Mar 2018

Arriving home Dan got to work. First he swapped out the regulator and no luck.

IMG_1974 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

IMG_1975 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

Next we open the engine and the stator is burnt totally and the wiring burned thru. Inside the case there was a 4 mm glob of what looked like solder freely floating (forgot to take a picture unfortunately). Poor job on the manufacture! It has only been in use since Kazakhstan (22,000 km ago!!). Not much we can do so we installed the new one and it is working well we think. The voltage reads 13.8 when riding, but 14.0 when in neutral. This is a new regulator and is Dan’s battery. The 650 was always 14.1! We shall have to see.

IMG_1978 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

IMG_1979 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

IMG_1980 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

IMG_1981 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
Thanks so much to Mike for saving us in a bad situation! This bourbon is well deserved .

IMG_1983 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

**saralou** · #7 19 Mar 2018

Today we are heading to the ferry across the Cook (as in Captain) Strait to the South island, but the sailing is not until 1330.

We headed out just after 7 and made for Mike’s favorite coffee and scone spot for breakfast. We then rode out to the Eastbourne Bays and then back and over the hills to the Wainuiomata Coast.

Screen Shot 2018-01-24 at 22.22.36 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

FILE2712 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr