New Zealand, Feb 18, 2010 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ... go to next day.

Another grey morning but the sun comes out for a second before disappearing again.

We start a long but gentle climb up to Burkes Pass (709m).

Around noon we have lunch at Farm Barn Cafe in Mt. Michael: ham, cheese and pineapple panini, and meat pie with salad.

Only in the last kilometer the climb gets steeper, but nothing like we'll face later in our tour.

The surrounding landscape is flat.

Lake Tekapo is serene and calm. Two hours later it is quite different: stormy and sending freezing rain horizontally to us.

The most popular place in town seems to be Pete's Pizza and Pasta, so we opt for McKenzie restaurant --- not spectacular, but they carry some nice local wines. We have halloumi salad and bread with spreads to start with, and then Tomi has mushroom pasta, and Tei salmon with potato-cauliflower croquets.

Today we ride 86.35K in no time; the cyclocomputer gets reset during our afternoon rest stop. Anyway, we are on the road from 8:30am. to 5:30pm.