The guide’s plan for today is easy: 60 km from Garston to Mossburn. I thought I’d kick it up a notch and go another 70km and see my mum.
I had an interesting historical ride around this ends of Southland. I dropped south at Lumsden and stopped off in Dipton where my father used to own the pub and met a local and talked history.
I also met Chris and Brent, two hairy bastards doing the Tour of Aotearoa, and we drank beers together.
Adventure! 🙂
The Statistics
The guide reckons this leg is an easy 60 km between Garston and Mossburn. To easy: I dropped on an extra 70 and visited the site of my mother’s ashes.
In the process, I threw in a hill because I’m that fucking tough! 🙂
The Ride
This part of the ride builds of the Around the Mountains cycle trail. It’s a very well maintained cycle trail that circles a mountain between Queenstown and Southland.
The trail itself is immaculately groomed and a very easy beginner ride, connecting all of the small towns in this area. The ride is a perfect introduction to bikepacking for newbies.
All throughout the ride are interesting reflection of a bygone age, whether it be the opening up of this area to the train, or something more modern, liked the decline of this “Tea Room”, which had it’s faded signage of the early to mid 20th century bearly readable in 2023.
Here’s the high def link to the tea room’s history
The ride cruised passed houses and buildings that have “moved on” in time, and left as echos of a past era.
I was left with a feeling, more than the other regions I had visited, that time had rolled over Southland like a tsunami, leaving historical flotsam and jetsam in it’s wake.
But the ride is more than just a physical insight into the used to be. It has some quirky elements which were obvious plays on the dominate animals in this area.
On this entire journey, I’ve passed so many sheep and beef/dairy animals I started to wish New Zealand grew something more exotic, like elephants and giraffes just to make the agricultural landscape more interesting.
And you see the effect: rivers so thick with nutrients from cattle runoff, their fertilizer effect grows green slime in the waterways.
I thoroughly enjoyed the Around the Mountains ride, especially it’s history.
Where my Mother Lays
I decided I’d go visit my mother’s burial site. Judith Monica Going Hogan died in 2015, and in accord with her wishes, she was cremated and her ashes scattered in Southland, where she grew up. My brother Greg and my niece Freya scattered her ashes.
Before this journey, I got a Google map pin from Greg, and if I could squeeze in a visit, I was going to.
My mother was deep into the Spiritualist Church, and it’s always effected me in in subtle ways. For example random things might not be random, and unusual things might not be caused by chance.
I’ve always been guided by science and rationalism but there’s always that side of my thinking that’s purely my mother.
For instance, she used to call me Daisy. And beside the road, leading to to her resting place, was nothing but daisies. That irrational part of me couldn’t help but feel my mother was excited to see me.
And when I got there, there was only one flower I could leave to acknowledge to her that I was here.
I think my mother would have been very proud of what I’ve done with my life and through this ride.🥰 With four of six of my immediate family dead, I owe it to them to live.
Dipton
Both of my parent’s came from Southland: mum from Winton, dad from Invercargill. And in his early life, my father ran the Dipton pub.
I cruised through Dipton wanted to see what happened to it. And randomly, I barrelled up the first local I could find and asked him.
It turns out that Neville Harris is the local Dipton historian and he showed me his cornicopia of history of the areas in his shed.
Neville moved here from Stewart Island in 1990, so came here after my father owned the pub in the 1960’s.
But he had part of the old counter in his shed:
And a photo of what they pub looked like in the 1980’s.
The pub was torn down in the late 1980’s when the publican tried to sell his license to sell alcohol from Dipton to Queenstown. Fearing losse of their local boozer, the locals placed an injunction on the sale, preventing the license leaving Dipton.
However, that spelt financial ruin for the publican who ended up absconding.
Eventually, the local council sold the pub and it was pulled down to make a car park.
And as Forest Gump would say, that is all there is to say about that.
I had a hell of a great time chatting with Neville, and he was excited that someone else was genuinely interested in the local history of his town.
Mossburn Pub
I’m staying tonight at the Mossburn Pub, owned by Tom. I don’t know Tom’s last name, but he is a legion in bikepacking circles for his hospitality.
A legioned well deserved – I’ve had the best hospitality, the best food and been made to feel at home (hear me Geraldine?)
That’s what’s working so well on this Around the Mountains ride – the hospitality at both Garston and Mossburn has been exceptional – you’re genuinely appreciated and welcome.
This is a Great Cycle Trail.
Chris and Brent
Chris and Brent are a couple of Wellingtonians doing the Tour of Aotearoa. Tonight is their last night, having done New Zealand in 21 days.
They rattled of their ride days, and only 2 were sub-100, their longest being 177kms in one day.
Their reasons for doing the Tour differed. Chris found the ride gave him and inner strength and fortitude. He found something personal in the experience.
Brent went because Chris, who lives down the street from him, asked him if he was keen one day at a set of traffic lights.
Brent, however, sees opportunity in creating packages around the cycle trails and making it easy for people to start and finish – a la how I described The Central Otago Trail.
I think he’s onto something and if he can make the logistics work, I wish him the best.
While we were dining, Chris hoovered down two entrees, a main and a dessert. Brent sucked up a entree a main and two desserts. I had an entree, main and dessert. And we all drank too much beer.
🍻
Tomorrow, Te Anau and I’m nearly at the end of my adventure. 🙂