Driving Miss Daisy... up Arthur's Pass

As it turns out, this elephant could actually do it over the Pass!
I had an early start and got on with the biking as fast as I could, I was afraid it would rain and even if it stayed sunny, I wanted to climb in the shade, avoiding the midday heat. Anyway, the distance to cover was really short, but a big climb.
My plan was to do it in a Driving Miss Daisy style, going slow even on the easy parts and taking my time so not a single ounce of energy was wasted. It almost worked...
The first 4 kms were actually quite underwhelming, to be honest. I did them easily and if it all was going to be that way, then I had gotten stronger than I thought.

But then I entered the Otira Gorge.
Confirmation, it is a 16% climb at times. How can I tell? Because my front wheel actually started lifting from the ground when I pedaled, even though I was leaning forwards...
I had two stops on the way, and in the most steep part I actually fell from the bike when a truck driver did not move to overtake. I bruised my elbow but the most annoying part is that i could almost not even stand up, the slope was too steep. My water bottle fell from the holder and started rolling downhill, luckily it got stuck in a rock so I could get it back. In that part of the climb there was no way to get back on the bike, so I had top push uphill something like 80-100 mts until it became "only" 10%ish and I could ride again. From then on, I went all the way, the remaining 5 kms of climb, at a very, very proper 5 kms/h.
So I drove Miss Daisy steadily past the most steep part, did not wave back when Josele's bus overtook me (he could take a photo, btw...) and I finally reached the top of the Pass!
It took me roughly 2 hours to climb 500 mts and cover just 15 kms, as the last 3 were downhill. Btw, I improved my last speed record on that downhill, i got up to 59.1 kms/h, so 1 km/h faster than in Wanaka.
I am now chilling out in the hostel and ready for a big meal, as I've had no breakfast... it would have been too heavy!

Edit: i managed to put in two pictures from my Iphone, one of today, and one of the glacier... More will come, rest assured!
Re-edit: I took photos of two photos of the pass from a museum display so I could give you more perspective, they are blurry, but ok...