As mentioned briefly on here previously, myself and my other half are off to spend 5 months cycling around NZ in October. Before that we’re hitting Thailand and Sydney. If we were going straight to NZ I’d take my Orange P7 (in touring mode) with me on the flights, but as we’re having a couple of long stops on the way I wondered whether it was worth shipping it there?

Actually I was wondering whether it was worth shipping at all (expensive? reliable?), or whether it would be better to buy something out there?

STW’s wise thoughts much appreciated…

What kind of cycling are you doing and how suitable is your bike for it? If your bike’s spot on, I’d take it, personally – I’d hate that feeling of ‘I’d love to do this on my own bike’.

For shipping, if you box the bike up as you would for flying, it should be fine; I shipped mine out to Canada, and while DHL smashed a fair amount of stuff, the bike was hunky dory.

As for whether to ship it, it may be cheaper to just take it on your flights and store it at the airport in each case while you travel about. Shipping by ship would probably take a month or so (although I’m not certain), plus you might then have to pick it up from the port.

Just my 2p, obviously! 🙂

If you are hotel bound then taking your bike is probably less of a hassle, if you’re not it gets a bit tiring. My wife and I dragged ski bags around NZ and HK, pretty soon I was wishing I had just shippped!

I used Excess Baggage to ship my bikes to the US. Cost about 300 each though.

When me n mrs tr did it in 08 we bought out there ! Was cheapest way as we flew with emirates

300 and 350 for a kona dew and jake even did mtb rAces on it !

Best time ever

http://Www.terry-and-jayne-cyclenz.blogspot.com or something like that !

Thanks guys – useful feedback. It will be road and trail touring mainly, and I have a P7 set up that I can use for that. £300 shipping might be scary though, so I’ll look into costs. Hate the idea of dragging the box around with me, so buying something 2nd hand out there might be the sensible option.

Thanks for the link Trail_rat – it looks utterly amazing, can’t wait to get there!

We sold our bikes when done too worked on 100 quid for our figures

They wanted to charge us excess baggage for each leg of the journey both ways ! We had 8 legs in total !!!

Oh and remember to get bikes IN to NZ they have to be spotlessly clean, not a hint of mud/dirt, basically showroom condition or you will never get past customs!

Oh and remember to get bikes IN to NZ they have to be spotlessly clean, not a hint of mud/dirt, basically showroom condition or you will never get past customs!

Very true – they need to seem like new.

My mate lived over here for a couple of years and then moved back to Auckland. He brought a Giant Anthem over here and then shipped it back home – it spent months in customs due to being ridden and having UK dirt on it

Hiring may be an easier option

You can also hire proper bike boxes, but I forget where from! Also, they may not hire the box for that long.

May be better to buy over there and then sell on when you leave.

Have fun, though! Jealous…..!

You’ll find new bikes and other kit in NZ to be eyebrow-raisingly expensive.

Whats the dollar at now ? My jake worked out 200 quid less than uk price …..Sure some stuf was expensive just had to look around !

£1 = $1.98. From my (quite limited) checking, stuff seems a bit cheaper out there, but not a huge amount. To be honest, it might be a nice opportunity to try something like a Jake or have a go back on an aluminium MTB.

I think I’ll start checking local ads and ebay just before we get there. Auckland is the first stop, so plenty of places to get kit. The P7 will have to miss this little adventure…

We moved out to NZ last year and brought our bikes with us but we had a campervan so no hassle carrying them around. Stuff is cheaper back home (I still order stuff from CRC) but it’s not silly expensive especially second hand. Check out the cycling section of http://www.trademe.co.nz for second hand bikes(they dont really use ebay here).

As for:

Oh and remember to get bikes IN to NZ they have to be spotlessly clean, not a hint of mud/dirt, basically showroom condition or you will never get past customs!

It’s not that bad to be honest. I cleaned all 3 bikes I’ve brought over the during the last 6 months and the tyres have still have had faint muddy residues etc on them and they weren’t too bothered. Depends on the customs guy I guess.

Cheers Krag – nice link.