Surf Highway

These pictures were taken on a 3-day trip over Easter. My original plan was to ride up to Gisborne, do the East Cape road (SH 35) and then come back via Rotorua, but the weather gods were angry and I switched to the West Coast instead.

I rode up to New Plymouth via the Surf Highway (SH 45). The next day I set off for Taupo via SH 3 and SH 30 with a side trip to Mt Damper thrown in for good measure. I have ridden most of the major roads in the North Island but had somehow missed this section of SH 3, which turned out to be 160km of motorcycling and scenic bliss.

Taupo is lovely, but I have been there many times before and couldn’t be arsed taking any pictures.

All in all, a rather fine trip.

 About half way around the Surf Highway I arrived at Opunake. I very nearly stayed here, but in the end headed for the bright lights of New Plymouth.

 Opunake Beach.

 Man in leather.

 Looking over Opunake Beach.

 A rather fine tunnel on the way to Mt Damper.

 The Bandit eying up said tunnel.

I never actually actually made it to Mt Damper, where there is allegedly a rather fine waterfall. After about 20km along a narrow, twisty road the surface turned from tarmac to gravel, and given that I was in the middle of nowhere and miles from any radio reception, I decided not to risk it. On the way back, I got held up by this lot, which was sort of nice.

This was taken somewhere along SH 3, near Mohakatino.