Bob’s letters from the Angel Tandem: Northland

Hi I’m Bob. So a bit about me.I’m the cool passenger on the Angel Tandem and we are hoping to raise awareness of vulnerable children through promoting Bald Angels. Anyway the GOFT has already told you about that. I’m not really a “ Care Bear” type more a “ Flare Bear” or as I like to put it, “ a Bear with Flare”, a very laid back kind of a bear. I’m all kitted out with helmet, sunglasses, neck warmer and high viz vest. I’ ll be blogging every once in a while just to give you a bit of balance to the trip.

Anyway we headed off from the Kerikeri Domain on the morning of the 12 October. We had lots of people cheering us off and I was beary excited and all 4 paws were waving at once. Our first destination was to Oronga Bay Russell. A cool 50 kms. We avoided state highway 10 and crossed the roundabout at the entrance to Kerikeri and headed out past the airport, turned left out towards Waimate and came back out at Puketona Junction, then headed off to Paihia, on to Opua, caught the ferry to Okiato and on to Oronga Bay.

The Rear Admiral is a bit afraid of roaming dogs chasing us, so I have had to reassure her that I would bear my teeth at them and they of course would be terrified, although I’m not prepared to take them on with my bear paws. I’m not a silly bear.

We had an ice cream at Opua which I enjoyed although my fur got a bit messy then, across we went on the ferry. We rode past The Rear Admiral’s famous ancestor’s property at Te Wahapu. His name was Gilbert Mair and he was responsible for building the church at Russell, you know the one with all the bullet holes in it. One of my forbears is famous too. You may have heard of him – Pooh Bear. Pretty cool huh. He liked honey and so do I. I do hope the GOTF and the Rear Admiral remembered to pack mine.

Anyway we arrived at Oronga Bay which is a pretty nice camp and I was feeling pretty hungry after all the effort of biking so I went to see where my honey was.

All I found when I stuck my head into a bag was some laundry powder which got all over my face. Hmmm not beary appertising, so I decided to go for a bit of a bush walk to take my mind off my hunger pains. Needless to say I lost my bearings a bit and didn’t get back to camp until late. The GOTF and The Rear Admiral were getting a bit concerned and as I emerged from the bush I didn’t realise I still had some white powder under my nose from the laundry powder. Well, talk about jumping to conclusions. There were wild accusations like meeting up with Cocaine Bear and mixing with the wrong type, etc, etc. They literally went bearzerk. The GOTF nearly choked on his beer. Typical of old people making generalisations about someone different from them. My bearlings were quite hurt. I just had to take a deep breath and paws for a moment. I was raised to comfort little children not deal with grumpy old people. I gave them a bear hug which Angel Bears are famous for and that seemed to settle them down. Anyway tomorrow was another day. I went off to see if I could find that honey and then get a good nights sleep. Sometimes you just have to grin and bear it.

The next few days were pretty exciting and we have peddled up lots and lots of hills. I’m doing my best but without a pot of honey it’s pretty tough going. In fact when we got to the camp at Ōakura as I was walking past the camp ablutions block I found myself talking to myself saying “honey, I just need honey”. To my surprise a voice came from inside and said“ Sorry mate, this is a toilet not a beehive”. How embearassing.

Anyway so far we have met up with some pretty interesting folks. There were the gals in Russell who approached us to ask if we were the people biking around NZ for Bald Angels and they had already been following us. There was Donna at Whananaki who the GOFT used to work with and now owns the general store there, and this is also where I got to meet Billy (as in goat), and his friend Lucy Lamb who thought she was a goat too. There was Mike, when we were on our way from Whangarei to Waipu, who had lost his greyhound and asked if we had seen it and then when he realised we were riding for Bald Angels, emptied his pockets of all the cash he had on him to donate, and apologised for not having more. And today we met Graham who was out for a walk on the Mangawhai boardwalk with his dog and wanted to know all about what we were doing and the Bald Angels. So many nice people out there. And then there was the nice lady at the top of the Mangawhai hill when we were a bit lost who drove past and then came back to give us directions. Not to forget all the road workers who waved and cheered us on. Lots of thumbs up.

Well that’s about it for now. Just a shout out to a beary special friend of mine who has just started school. Hope it’s going well for you Ella Smith.

That’s it for now – I am beary tired and we have to bike to Orewa tomorrow.

Bob.