A Magic Ride! Paeroa to Thames (and return) - 64kms

We took off at 8.00am this morning. We wanted to make sure that our 64kms round trip to Thames wouldn't see us arriving back to Paeroa in the dark!
To our surprise, the trail took us off-road all the way on fine, evenly spread gravel. Cycling was a breeze!
The trail to Thames began just across the road from the motel.
It took us through farm land with more herds of bucolic bovines, roaming chickens, the odd rabbit and stacked, plastic-wrapped, cylinders of recently cut hay.


We manoeuvered through narrow openings to cross minor roads to rejoin the trail on the other side.





We crossed 68 cattle grids (34 each way).
Most were made of metal bars, which we could cycle over without dismounting.
We crossed 46 bridges (23 each way). They crossed rivers, streams and drains. 




Most had a short but steep run up from the flat trail and a nice run down on the other side. We were pleased to have the assistance of the e bikes.









The trail led to an underground pass below the Firth of Thames Bridge.

On the other side, two statues of Maori warriors weilding weapons could be seen flanking both sides of the road to Thames.




The trail into Thames led us through avenues of native bush then, as businesses and houses appeared, it ran alongside the main road to town.

                     
            We stopped at the Wharf Cafe for an early lunch at 11.00am.



Lunch over, we headed back to Paeroa on the trail, stopping briefly at one of the two toilet stops along the way.
We arrived back at the motel in lots of time to complete our blog/journal and collect pumpkin lasagne from Countdown for dinner.
Altogether we've had a very successful and satisfying three days cycling some of the Hauraki Rail Trails.


 

Comments

  1. KimMarch 26, 2021 at 3:19 AM

    Looks like a great trail! Would love to try it one day

    ReplyDelete

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