Bikepacking

 When travelling, either by car, motorbike or on foot, when conditions allow,  my preferred form of accommodation is a tent.

This has the benefit of being cheap and sometimes free and is usually a lot of fun.

Over the years I have stayed at all sorts of campsites ranging from luxurious glamping to cowboy camping in the remote bush and everything in between. The more remote campsites though are my favourites as these days I prefer to camp either alone or with one or two friends to share the experience.

There is something primal about sleeping in the great outdoors and experiencing the sights, sounds and smells of nature which is something you are unlikely to do in a flash hotel. I also like the change of routine that camping and holidays in general bring, although don’t get me wrong, I also like routine and sleeping in the same comfortable bed every night, just not all the time.

Camping also has it’s downsides and can be a miserable experience if the weather is bad and especially if you have poor gear, so it is not for everyone.

I also cycle regularly, but until now have somehow never combined this with camping, which is properly known as bikepacking.

For sometime now I have been considering riding the Tour Aoteroa Trail which stretches 3000 km from Cape Reinga to Bluff, which I hope to do early 2027. Parts of this route are quite remote and will necessitate camping, so now seemed like a good time to give bikepacking a go. 

Much of the trail is off-road so to this end I purchased a Giant Toughroad gravel bike as my trusty steed.

I have been on a number of local rides to build up my fitness which is currently greatly lacking as I have grown soft and been using an e-bike in recent years.

With the promise of fine weather it seemed like now was a good time to venture further afield and really stretch myself.

The target of this trip was the Remutaka Summit via the Hutt River and Remutaka  Rail trails. The distance to the summit according to my Garmin satnav was 67km which didn’t seem too bad, although there was a worrying amount climbing to be done.

I loaded up the bike with my camping gear and hit the road. 

It immediately became apparent that riding a heavily laden bike required way more effort than I had expected. Unladen and on the flat my average speed on the Toughroad is about 25 km/hr but now I was down to 10 - 15 km/hr meaning I was going to be in for a long day.

The first 40 km or so to Upper Hutt were reasonably flat so weren’t too bad although I was already getting tired by this stage. I had the option at this point of admitting defeat (which I nearly did) and camping at the nearby Harcourt Park but it was still relatively early in the afternoon so decided to press on.

From this point it was nearly all off-road and with lots of steep climbs which lowered my already glacial rate of travel to that of continental drift.

The track climbed steeply from Maymorn up through a forest before eventually arriving at the start of the rail trail. For me this was physically a tough but also surprisingly enjoyable section.

The summit is 10 km from the start of the Rail Trail and uphill all the way although not particularly steep but, all the same, it was still a relief when I finally arrived at the campsite.

There is a small shelter at the summit and amazingly some flush toilets which is the height of luxury in the NZ wilderness where long-drop toilets or indeed no toilets at all are the norm.

I only had an hour until it got dark so immediately got the tent set up and dinner going, which consisted of freeze-dried Beef Teriyaki.

The weather had been fantastic all day with clear skies and light winds. As the sun went down the temperature plummeted and I was soon freezing. It was at this point that I discovered that I had forgotten to pack my duck down jacket so I had no alternative but to scurry back to my tent and into my sleeping quilt.

I was the only person at the summit and I doubt there was another soul within 15km or so, so the nights entertainment consisted of some zombie shows on Netflix.

I woke up in the morning feeling a little chilly and once again roundly cursed myself for forgetting my jacket. I got up to find the tent covered in ice which was a real surprise as I knew the temperature was low, but not that low!

I quickly got some coffee and porridge going and then packed up my gear and hit the freezing road.

The journey back was the reverse of yesterday, so mostly downhill and consequently easier going. This was the theory anyway but not so much in reality as once the sun came up it got uncomfortably hot and I was mightily relieved when I finally arrived home and had a nice cup of tea.

Overall it was an enjoyable trip but shows how much fitness I am going to need to gain to complete the Tour Aotearoa which has plenty of sections much harder than the above.