Waiheke, Rated in Low Gears

I've rated each part of the day out of seven gears. You'll see why.

The ferry: four out of seven.

I left Albany at six, which is early for a student and still almost not early enough. Weekend ferries from downtown to Waiheke can fill up, and the queue already looked longer than the boat. We got on. That was the first win of the day, and I spent it at once by telling her the island was not that hilly.

The crossing from the downtown terminal to Matiatia takes about 35 to 45 minutes. Ours was closer to forty. Long enough for the two men behind us to restart the America's Cup. One of them kept saying "eight-one", quietly, like a man checking a bruise. The other said "nine-eight", and "San Francisco", and "Oracle", and then they both looked at the water as if it might offer a recount. She watched the city get smaller and did not ask who had won. I was grateful. I was also already hungry, which I ignored, because I eat once a day and I had packed for later.

The hire desk: three out of seven.

Bike hire is a short walk from the Matiatia wharf. Buses and taxis were waiting for people with more sense. There was a visitor information point too, with maps, one of which I took and folded into a shape that would not fold back. The man looked at our shoes, then at the ordinary mountain bikes, and asked if we had ridden hills before. "Yes," I said, thinking of the slope up to Massey, which in my memory had become a mountain.

Helmets on. A short roll around the car park, which was flat, and therefore a lie.

The climb to Oneroa: two out of seven.

Oneroa village and the beach are about a 20-minute walk from the wharf, and the road is uphill. On a bike I had assumed this would be shorter and easier. It was shorter. Waiheke is hilly, with steep winding roads, a fact I had accepted in theory, the way you accept that ovens are hot.

I found a low gear. I found another. Neither was as low as the road. After a stretch of standing on the pedals, I got off and walked, pushing the bike with the air of a man who had chosen a scenic pace. She was still in the saddle, moving slowly, not showing off, which was worse.

"Nice day for it," I said.

"It is," she said, and waited at the next bend without comment.

The village: four out of seven.

Oneroa has cafes, shops and a sandy beach, and on a January Saturday it has all of them at once. She wanted to look at menus. We looked at four. I stood with the bike and the bag and the unopened box of lemon rice, practising the face of a person who was not hungry. She read the boards thoroughly, as if one of them might be addressed to her.

"This one has a mushroom breakfast," she said.

"It does," I said.

I did not open the bag. There is a small, stupid pride in a packed lunch, and I was not ready to spend the only meal I was going to have in front of a board I was never going to order from. She bought a coffee and did not push it. I liked her more for that, and also for not mentioning the hill.

The longer roads: three out of seven.

We kept going, towards Palm Beach, because she wanted another bay and I said that sounded easy. Vineyards showed on the ridges, tidy rows against the scrub. We did not go in. I had the lunch, I was still saving it, and I was not sure what a vineyard does with a vegetarian who is trying not to fall over.

The heat sat on the road and came back up at us. Wear a hat. Carry water, more than you think, and do not finish it just because a tree looks shady. The island is larger than it looks from the ferry. We stopped under a pohutukawa that was doing its best, and I moved the gear lever with great ceremony. Nothing happened, which at least felt consistent.

The lunch: six and a half.

We ate on a bench above a small bay, not a famous one, just a slice of water between branches. I opened the box. The lemon rice had settled and gone a bit soft, and the laddu had stuck to the paper. It was still the best decision I had made since getting on the boat.

She had bought a salad somewhere in the village, and did not hide how glad she was to swap me a forkful for a piece of the sweet. We ate slowly, because I was not going to get another go at this until tomorrow.

My phone rang. Mum, from India, where it was still morning. "Have you eaten?" she said, as if she had been watching the box from there.

"Just now," I said, and held the phone a little too close to the lemon rice, in case the smell could travel. She asked if I was on a hill. I told her I had been. She said, "Drink water," and rang off before I could make the day sound more organised than it was.

The ferry home: five out of seven.

Leave more time than the map suggests. You have to get the bikes back to the hire place and still make the boat, and the hills on the way in are still hills on the way out. Do not miss the last ferry. We made ours with minutes to spare, which is not the same as making it comfortably. She was cheerful. I was sore in places I usually ignore.

On the crossing I found the map again, still folded into that shape, with a smear of turmeric on the corner. The empty box sat in my bag and knocked against my hip when the boat moved.

I thought about the gear lever, which I had clicked all day like a man solving a problem. It occurred to me, very late, that one of the gears had never been there.