Circuit of Christchurch

September 16, 2006
I did a 50-mile bike ride today that was half on city streets (most of which have bike lanes) and half out in the country. There was a huge (but warm) wind from the northwest, which meant that I had to work hard heading out but then I just sailed on the way home. I've put in a map of my route (who knows if you can read it!) and the X is where I'm moving to next week. Note the lack of streets just south of the X. It's farmland and the port hills. I took a few pictures today not far from there so you can see what the countryside is like (see bottom of page).

I did learn today that not every Kiwi is a lovely person. While I was biking along one of the roads with no other bikers in site and only an occasional car, someone decided to cut directly in front of me and turn left. Good thing I was biking into the wind and wasn't going very fast so I could stop without hitting the car. I'm sure he did it on purpose as there was no one else around. The other evidence from my ride that everyone here isn't perfect is that I passed the Christchurch Women's Prison. Hopefully I will never see the inside of that place! Although I bet it's nicer than most prisons.

When I was about 5 minutes from home, what sounded like an air raid siren went off. It was 12:40 so it wasn't the noon whistle from somewhere. Maybe it was the 12:40 whistle? But after the meteor last week, I'm a little suspicious of weird noises. Although I haven't figured out what that was, I have found out what everyone is fishing for in the Avon River (see post from about a week ago). And no, I'm afraid that it's not the rare giant bully. In fact, it's just the opposite. It's white bait - a little fish (maybe like smelt?) that I thought was only on the west coast but I guess not. It's so small that they don't gut them or anything. They just cook them whole and eat them up - body, tail, head and eyeballs!! Yummy! I wonder if I'll get to try them sometime?!