My friend Neil and I traveled on our motorbikes to the Coldkiwi Rally.
This event has been held every year for the last 34 years near Waiuru in the central North Island. At this time of the year this is one of colder places one might wish to stay, particularly if you are camping; as we and another 2000 other masochistic bikers were.
The trip up goes through some great scenery, so was pleasant enough, even if it did rain for most of the way, though at least it was of the drizzly kind, rather than the torrential stuff we have had for most of the winter.
The rally site we stayed at wasn’t quite were we expected it to be. Somehow I had envisaged it being close to the main road. It turned out to be 5km down a gravel/mud track, which made for some interesting moments on my sportsbike, which is not really designed for this kind of terrain. If was worth it when we got there though as the site was in a lovely rural setting with views over to Mt Ruhapehu.
Events were in full swing when we got there, so we quickly pitched the tent and headed of to the fun. The fun included wheelie, burn out and hill climbing competitions. Needless to say we watched, rather than took part. The burnouts in particular were pretty spectacular, assuming you fancy blowing up (literally) a couple of hundred dollars worth of rear tire. Good to watch, but to take part you need to be very drunk, deranged or both.
In the evening a large bonfire was set alight, with a moped placed on top instead of a guy. Best place for a moped if you ask me. Later on there were some fireworks, followed by a rather good covers band and lots of beer.
We woke up in the morning to find the tent covered in a solid layer of ice, so in that respect the Coldkiwi certainly lived up to its reputation.
After a fry up it was back home to Wellington on the bikes.
All in all, a top weekend.
I took a few photo’s, which are posted below. My camera is not working properly at the moment, so my apologies for the standard of the pictures. I can heartily not recommend a Canon Digital Rebel.
We pitched the tent then headed off to check things out. Note the rather lovely SV1000S,
A rather cold Neil. Note the frost and ice.
Mt Ruhapehu.
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