I drank about 8 litres of water and did not pee much. I probably should have drank even more. Towards the afternoon I started adding electrolytes to the water, and it really had an effect. My body immediately let me know it wanted more of the salty sugary electrolyte goodness.
Fortunately I did not have any trouble finding water refills. Unlike somewhere like the Mackenzie Country there were small towns or churches with a tap quite frequently here in Canterbury.
I stopped for lunch in Oxford, home of Who Ate All The Pies. Stupendously good pies, even in 36° heat. I ate two pies.
Onwards on the back road to Ashley Gorge, where from the bridge I could see hundreds of people swimming in the river. I guess it was Waitangi weekend and the hottest day of the year, and this was a most lovely little river for swimming and sitting in the shade.
Onwards ever onwards, through the baking brown land.
It is very dry land. The previous night at the Waimakariri I had seem a huge fire in the distance, as I woke in the night to pee.
Apparently more than 70 firefighters and 7 helicopters were battling a blaze.
It looked like this from my pee spot, but this is not my photo.
Towards the end of the day I struck some bad gravel roads for an hour. Deep gravel from roadworks maybe? My heavily loaded bike with narrow tires did not like the gravel, and slid side to side, sometimes digging in and throwing the steering off. It was not fun having to concentrate so much, and I vowed to avoid gravel in future until I got fat wide tires.
Finally I pulled in to Leithfield Beach holiday park which was packed with Waitangi weekend holidaymakers.
Not a very nice camp. There were few trees and no shade until about 3pm but there was a cool beach with crashing waves. I wasn't brave enough to swim but I paddled up to my ankles in the cool water, before collapsing into a sweaty sleep. Overnight I didn't even use a sheet, just bare on the camping mat. It didn't cool down much at all.
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