One day, we will travel again. Until then, I want to bring you stories of epic adventures to inspire your post-COVID adventures! This week, I interview best friends—Nina Mariana Pascha and Gina Bourne—about their two-month cycling trip in New Zealand last year. The pair had no prior cycling experience BEFORE the trip and made the most of it! Check out how they overcame the mental and physical challenges. (Hint: It involved roadside dance breaks!)
Names: Gina Bourne & Nina Mariana Pascha
Age: 27 years old (both)
Hometown: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Country count: Gina – 29 & Nina – 28
Instagram: @spinning_noodle_sisters
1. How did you start traveling?
We both grew up in families that travel, so it’s a natural process for us to be curious to travel as adults. During university years, we both traveled—either volunteering or studying abroad in Asia and the United States. After university, we both worked for a few years. Gina lived a nomadic life traveling for seasonal work in outdoor education, and Nina invested her time in corporate work life in Amsterdam.
After years of studying and working, we, then, decided to get out to fulfill our dream of visiting New Zealand (NZ) on a Working Holiday Visa.
2. What was the inspiration for cycling New Zealand?
Since our teen years, we both knew we wanted to travel New Zealand together. However, it took us 10 years to finally make our way there for a Working Holiday Visa. During our planning phase, Gina’s dad planted the idea of cycle touring as he did back in the ‘70s through the North and South Islands [of New Zealand]. After some research, we got inspired by the idea and felt like it was a challenge worth accepting. Little did we know that we would experience the NZ landscape and locals like we’ve never traveled before!
3. Tell us all the details! (Planning, the route, cycling experience etc.!)
The Route: We cycled for two months covering 2,000 km through the South Island starting in Nelson and Motueka in the Abel Tasman National Park region, going down the west coast and finishing cross country towards the east coast in a small coastal town called Oamaru. We planned and roughly followed the official Tour Aotearoa cycling route all the way down to Lake Mavora, cycling through Nelson Lakes National Park, Murchison, Greymouth, Franz Josef Glacier, Haast Pass and Queenstown. When possible, we would enjoy many of NZ’s official cycle trails, including the Tasman’s Great Taste Trail, West Cost Wilderness Trail, Around the Mountain and Queenstown Trail. We eventually ventured off the Tour Aotearoa route to Te Anau and continued back up to Mount Cook to take the Alps 2 Ocean Cycle Trail to Oamaru.
Planning & Experience: Before taking on NZ, we had absolutely no idea about cycle touring. We didn’t know how to change a tire, maintain our bikes, even how to route plan or any of the basics! We did not physically train for this journey, and we bought our cycle touring [bikes and gear] in country. All we knew was that we were motivated and wanted to challenge and prove to ourselves that we could cycle a country! We approached our journey day-by-day and wanted to see how far we could make it. We started with a rough idea of our cycle route, and the further south we travelled, the more confident we became learning from cyclists we met who shared cycle touring tips on how to plan our routes, the phone apps and maps to use, and how to cycle tour efficiently.
4. Share your favorite adventures from the trip.
Cycling New Zealand’s landscape, especially in the South Island, was incredibly rewarding as we cycled through glacier valleys, rivers, mountain passes and fern forests. However, [it was] at times not for the faint hearted.
One of the biggest challenges we faced was the Haast Pass. That day we cycled 70 kilometres through glacier river valleys and faced a steep uphill climb of 1,200 meters elevation. Determined to not push our bikes up the steep mountain road, we took on multiple dance breaks and ate chocolate on gravels mounds as we watched vans struggling up the bending roads. After reaching the summit, we celebrated by skinny dipping into a glacial swimming hole!
Another highlight was coasting down the Crown Range switchbacks towards Queenstown for many kilometres, after spending the morning climbing the Cardrona Mountain pass from Wanaka. The summit was so high up that the planes flying into Queenstown were cruising below us!
5. What were your favorite places in New Zealand? Any off-the-beaten path spots you recommend?
There is so much beautiful jaw-dropping scenery in NZ, and it’s hard to only mention a few of our personal top favorite places. Murchison was one of our favorites because we met amazing fellow cyclists and swam in the Buller River. Another experience was taking the steam boat across Lake Wakatipu from Queenstown to cycle Walter Peak towards Lake Mavora, where we envisioned Legolas [from Lord of the Rings] galloping down the mountain range towards us with his sexy silver hair.
One of the best off-the-beaten tracks we took was the West Coast Wilderness Trail, where we found ourselves cycling through single track fern forests, across milky glacier rivers and coasting down quiet hobbit hills. Other must see places include Lake Pukaki’s crystal blue waters with views of Mount Cook and free camping spots along the water.
6. What was your biggest struggle during the trip and how did you overcome it?
The biggest challenge of this journey was developing our mental and physical resilience. At times, we would find ourselves struggling and breaking down from hunger, injuries or physical exhaustion. After a little while, we found ourselves getting fitter and stronger, both mentally and physically. (Although, we did lose it a few times!) We took turns having our mental breakdowns and made sure that we always supported each other with words of encouragement, dance breaks to keep the morale high and worked as a team to continue on, taking rest days to recover and refueling ourselves with multiple meals and chocolate chip cookies.
7. What was the cost of your trip? Share a few budget tips!
Budget Tips: We believe that cycle touring is one of the most budget and sustainable ways to travel the world. If you are willing to camp and to live with the basic means, you can travel a long way with your money. To keep costs low we mainly camped at free camp grounds, Department of Conservation (DOC) camp sites, and Warmshowers. On the road, we kept our food basic and nutritious and still treated ourselves to our Burger Tour of NZ burger stops. As we didn’t have to pay for petrol, our food became our fuel.
Budget Breakdown: Budget wise, we both arrived in New Zealand with savings in order to afford bicycles, equipment and pay for our living expenses for the two months on the road. Lucky for us, our style of travel was a lot cheaper than we thought as most nights we spent camping at Department of Conservation sites in our mono-tent, which required a small donation fee of 5-8 NZD per person per night. At times, we would splash out for a hostel so that we could cook and have a hot shower, this may cost around 20-30 NZD depending on the region. We ate simple foods cooked from a small camping stove and often swam in rivers and lakes at the end of the day to feel clean. During our two month cycle [trip], we spent between 3,000-4,000 NZD (just under 2,000-2,500 USD), this is including purchasing our bikes and equipment.
We would say our biggest expense were purchasing our bicycles and equipment for the cycle tour, whilst Nina spent just under 1,000 NZD for her brand new set up, Gina budgeted less with 700 NZD. However, once the cycle tour was over, we both sold our bicycles and equipment, so part of that investment was returned. If you already have your cycle gear and bicycle ready, then the second biggest expense was the food, as we ate our way through New Zealand. In hindsight, this expense was not too much considering food was our fuel to cycle the amount that we did and we gladly took on the ultimate burger tour of New Zealand challenge, stopping at cafes for local lunches, coffees, ice creams and snacks along the way.
8. Travel is often the best teacher. What is the biggest lesson this trip taught you about yourself or the world?
This cycle trip taught us that it is okay to feel uncomfortable. It means that you are pushing your comfort zone, growing and experiencing the world. You can achieve anything you put your mind and heart to. You just have to want it and do your best. You don’t have to be the fittest, strongest or lycra-wearing cyclist to get out there and cycle the highest mountains. You just have to try, and in time, you will learn and develop along the way.
9. What are three most useful things you packed for this trip?
A compact camping stove, high visibility utility vest, and Platapus, our 3 liter water bladder.
10. What’s your next adventure?
Now that we have the cycle touring bug, our next adventure will be Southeast Asia coming up in 2022. Our rough plan would be to start in Indonesia going through Malaysia, up into Thailand, round to Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and back home to Chiang Mai, Thailand. Even though we grew up in Thailand, we never got a chance to explore our neighbouring countries and this opportunity will give us the chance to experience Asia like we have never before. We plan on eating our way through bowls and bowls of noodles!
For more details about their trip, check out their podcast interview on The School of Travels Podcast available on Apple Podcasts!
