This journey doesn’t seem to want to end. Firstly we had to wait in the plane in Bali for 20 minutes so we wouldn’t arrive in Sydney before the 6am opening time. We were expecting to land in Sydney in a few minutes when the captain informs us there has been a major malfunction with air traffic control and the landing time scheduled for us is outside the window of fuel remaining on board. So we diverted to Canberra for more fuel and a new flight plan to return to Sydney. We arrived in Sydney 3 hours late and someone had parked their plane in our space! Of course we missed our connection to Auckland. We are booked on an afternoon flight, it could have been worse. We had a lovely day with Paddy and Jules in Auckland with a nice brunch followed by a walk on a local walkway. Very relaxing in the warm sunshine. On Monday we collected the bike with no fuss, it was great to be reunited. We then had a miserable ride to Cambridge in torrential rain....
I agonised for months about which bike to bring on this trip and then spent more months preparing it for the journey. It hasn’t missed a beat. 3 oil changes 3 tyre changes 1 set of front brake pads. The 14T front sprocket is badly worn and will end its days on display in my workshop. Punctures 0 😄 It has been used and abused, dropped, and ridden on many many roads and trails it was never designed to be on. This kind of trip is all about compromise, sometimes I wished for a bigger bike, sometimes I was glad it wasn’t bigger. It has handled everything we have dished out to it and not once let us down. It is a miracle it hasn’t shaken itself to bits. It has been a great servant and we couldn’t have asked for more.
It was funny packing the bike today knowing that it was for the last time. The descent from the Cameron Highlands was a delight, narrow winding roads with beautiful bush scenery in cool mountain air. Before we knew it we were on the motorway and heading for the megatropolis of Kuala Lumpur. What a massive city. We entered from the north and are staying in the south closer to the airport. We navigated the labyrinth of the motorways and found our hotel ok Our hotel is quite large with apartments as well as hotel rooms. There is a large shopping complex nearby so we should be ok here for a few days. Also the carpark has a carwash with very obliging man so things are falling into place. The next few days we will be busy organising the shipping for the bike and cleaning it thoroughly for NZ customs. Suddenly our journey comes to an end. It hasn’t sunk in yet. So this is the last daily post. Thank you all for reading it. ...
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