Kerikeri Holiday Park to Waitangi Holiday Park 25 km Day 15 Interestingly, this pricey little room did not come with housekeeping included, so we clean it before we leave this morning. We have a selection of wonderful vegetable quiche-like pastries for breakfast at a cafe called Zest. (Are there this many amazing bakeries in the …
Month: November 2017
11/1 Choreful Layover
Kerikeri Holiday Park Layover 0 km Many town chores today. New shoes for Parker; we only find sandals, that will have to do. Go through the bounce boxes, re-post those. Figure out the next 2-3 resupply sections in fine detail. Tackle some state of the union issues. Clean everything as well as possible. We sign …
10/31 KeriKeri
Puketi Hut to Kerikeri Holiday Park 23 km I can’t believe it still hasn’t rained. All that potential flooding disaster! All those days and hours stacked up with predictions of deluge! I supposed I should blindly accept, gratefully, before jinxing our dry little hiking party. We have a pleasant parting breakfast with John, and say …
10/30 Among the Kauris
Waipapa River Crossing to Puketi Hut 13 km The track this morning compels us straight up out of the gorge. Amazingly, there is almost no mud today. The track is flat, side to side at least, and balances perfectly on top of the the thin sharp spine of the ridge arm we are following up, …
10/29 Across the Gorge, An Unusual Dessert
Parking by Giant Stump to Waipapa River Crossing 13 km An early start, the plan being to race the rain that may come today. If something prevents us from crossing the gorge today, we will be out of luck for the next week, or have the option of backtracking and taking a long high water …
10/28 Mangamuka
Farm Camp to Pullout for Giant Stump 18.6 km Glorious sleep-in morning! Everything is soaking wet from condensation, as we slept in just the screen tent last night, but once the sun pokes through the clouds, everything dries quickly and the air gets hot. Irresponsibly, Prana and I did not wash the mud off ourselves …
10/27 The Ratea
Start of Ratea Track to Farm Camp 16 km I don’t know how to adequately describe today. It was similar to the Herekino Forest Track except...muddier. The one boon was that it was not as steep entering or exiting; this was countered by the fact it was notably longer. Total score = minus 1. The …
10/26 Out of the Forest, Into the Farms
Corner of Digger’s Valley Road to start of Ratea track 22 km / 14 Miles It is a day of embracing mud. Mud in the shoes, mud in the socks, mud under the pant legs up to the knees. It squelches and squishes and squirts and splashes, and wherever it touches, it adamantly clings to. …
10/25 The Herekino
Aripaha HP to the corner of Digger’s Valley Road 16 km / 10 miles Today we walk not on a beach. Today we enter the forest! I actually loved the beach and I’m a bit nostalgic it’s over already; it continued to grow on me, and I had expected the opposite. But then, new scenery …
10/24 A Milkshake by Any Other Name
Waipapakauri Holiday Park to Ahipara Holiday Park 14 km One more delicious sparkling juice for the morning (getting a little obsessed with these things) to go with breakfast porridge. Sunny skies today- I can’t believe how well the timing worked out to be inside in the first torrential day we’ve had. Back out onto the …
muddy shoe memoirs 