Peter and Carey escape to France: Getting closer

Working through the visicitudes of life and still doing our planning. Learnt a lot this week about GPS units! Having purchased the cool Oregon 550t unit to guide us on our travels (it mounts onto the handlebars of my bike) - cost was around $900NZ - couldn't buy them in NZ (thanks Dad for the birthday and christmas presents that funded the purchase!), we now have to purchase:

1. The map to use ($150US for City Navigator Europe) and then a separate one for Australia and NZ and US when ready to use them. I think we can update them in the future at no cost - but time will tell! So, I went on to download this, to find that my handheld unit didn't have enough memory. SOOO had to go and buy a microSD card, just to download it.

2. What a load of fun and games. Went online to Noel Leeming and spent 45 mins on the phone to them to order a micro SD card with 2GB memory (as the information on the Garmin website said it only took a 3.75GB memory card - then I looked somewhere else and it said it took a 4GB memory!!). Got that couriered to me, for $40, then when I was in Taupo yesterday, bought an 8GB memory card for $100 and am currently waiting the 50 minutes for the mapping programme to download onto that card in my GPS. God I hope it all works!!!

So, I spend money on the technology, while Peter is busy spending more money on the bikes. We now have new brake pads on both the bikes, bike computers that work (when you pack the bike up for shipping, the cable on the bike computer often gets jammed and nicked and stops working), new spare chain links, a spoke tool thingy and a new chain on my bike, and $225 less in the bank!

I'm very skilled at ruining chains on my bike - I'm not very good at changing gears at tops of hills (I think I am too optimistic about my strong legs being able to rotate the peddles in a higher gear - then when I change gears it is too hard and I have to change back down... so I stretch the chain!). I did this on the first day of our trip in Australia and again the other day riding up Waihi Hill. I really do have to practice more!

So, today, as well as work and reviewing the Budget, I am hoping to learn how to use the GPS when the mapping software is downloaded, but probably not, as we aren't in Europe so it won't pick the stuff up.

Have booked our Eurostar trip from London to Bordeaux. Are staying the Sunday night with Tracey and Trevor, which will be lovely, then tube in from Ealing to Kings Cross (St Pancras). We have to change train stations in Paris (which takes anywhere from 15 mins to 50 mins depending on the instructions I printed out!). Then a couple of nights in Bordeaux, then we will go and visit with Jason South and Isabelle in St Emilion to plan out the next phase of our trip.