The day after the Timber trail was a bit of a non event. I woke up, gave my bike a bit of a service as the gears were slipping, threw some oil on the old girl and we were off.
Almost the whole day was spent heading down one of the main highways. It was hilly but actually relatively pleasant.
Today I decided I’d take a slightly more circuitous route down to Whanganui that went along the Mountain to Sea cycle route next to the Whanganui river. The 25km or so down to where the route started were good fun, the road weaving it’s way down through lush virgin forest before hitting the river.
The river itself, famous for being navigable from source to mouth, cut through the hills and was mostly surrounded by forest or by farms in which loads of beehives could be found.
I only mention this because some muppets decided to house a massive number of these hives right on the side of the road and seemingly picked the moment I was cycling past to move/tend to/aggravate the bees. At first I didn’t notice people working on the hives, I just thought it was a bit weird that the number of bees was quickly increasing, but as the density reached its peak I noticed 3 people in full bee protection suits working on the side of the road. I was genuinely in a swarm and, having decided to floor it, was getting smacked by large quantities of bees, only one of which successfully stung me and seemingly not particularly badly. I reckon the beekeepers were equally surprised at me going past as I was at having to navigate a swarm of bees.
After that scare I cracked on with my cycle and all was going well until just before the last climb of the day at which point another bloody spoke went. I tried to fiddle with the wheel a bit as it was rubbing on the frame but it was no good. So once again, I jumped in the back of a car with my bike and got her to a shop.
Some legend in The Bike Shed, fixed her up in no time and at no cost and I was done for the day. It was a nice day of cycling and both the road to Pipiriki and the Mountain to Sea cycle route were beautiful, but losing confidence in the bike is a real bummer. I’m going to gas it down to Wellington, hopefully getting there the day after tomorrow, and may well have to invest in a new wheel. I hope she holds out till then.
Bish on a Bike 
The bee episode sounds quite frightening. I thought you had replaced the whole wheel a week ago when 2 spokes went. I would certainly do so now.
I had 🙄