Te Araroa : Wanganui to Levin

KM this section : 165
KM completed : 1531

On the beach, just past Koitiata.

After taking a day longer than planned with the kayak thing, I'm minded to keep walking without a break for a while - I mean, I was just sitting down for the last few days.  And the holiday park is nice enough, but at least six kilometres out of town so hardly handy for shopping and so forth.  But, in the event I feel a bit broken as I walk into the city, and passing a nice looking motel it is just too tempting.  Works out well in the event, I wander Wanganui sans pack, buy some new pole ends, walking shoes and of course food, and see the sights.  Seems a nice place, I like the regional museum which has giant moa skeletons, stone axe heads looking just like those from neolithic Europe but just a century or two old, and an amazing seventy seater war canoe.  Of course there is also a pub, time for the usual massive burger then.

Pun-tastic Bulls.

From here, the route involves a few days of pretty dull road walking through what is, for NZ, a populous region.  I visit the towns of Bulls and Feilding and the city of Palmerston North, I could probably speed up here but camping would be tricky, as it is I have pleasant stops at Koitiata (free camping for TA trampers!), Mount Lees (a B&B for a change - luxury and home cooked food!), and Palmerston North (cheap food from Pak'nSave).  The section alongside a busy highway isn't ideal, there have been a few of these where I'm pretty sure a better if slightly longer route could be found along minor roads - perhaps they just think people will hitch-hike?

I at least get to leave the roads for the last seventy kilometres or so before Levin... am I pleased to see the bush?  Not really.  There is of course a bit where the (signed, clearly correct) track on the ground deviates massively from the line on the official map, adding maybe three kilometres.  The day after features some foul mud, the new shoes keep it out pretty well, but their soles are disintegrating, I've lost a pole end too, the Wanganui purchases not going so well.  I do achieve something though, fifteen hundred kilometres done.  Is it halfway?  Hard to say, given how unrelated to reality the official distances are... still, getting there.  Levin is nine kilometres off the route, but I need a rest, and to shop, and of course eat beef.  Why, double up on the burger and bacon you say, don't mind if I do.

Most artistic.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : Raetihi to Wanganui

KM this section : 118
KM completed : 1366

So, I get the tent up at Raetihi - pole still behaving - and notice plenty of canoes around.  Why yes they do hire them, all booked up though.  Dammit, I am not giving up on this.  The guide makes it clear this is one of the highlights of the trip, I even wrote to my niece that I'd be doing it... all I need to find is a company willing to take a boat to Pipiriki for me.  And in fact the second I call will... not loving the two hundred and fifty dollars cost but what can you do.  Of course they say, you can join a group that left Whakahoro yesterday, so if I'd got any signal... Sigh.  I can at least paddle for eighty kilometres or so down to Wanganui the city (no 'h' - yes they are talking about changing it).

Just keep it pointing downstream, easy.

Well, the walk to Pipiriki is easy enough, good thing as the canoe company want me there at 2pm to take charge of what turns out to be a kayak.  Well, given it is chucking it down I am happy to not be walking in the afternoon.  Next day I 'portage', or carry the kayak down to the river - it is very heavy - and stuff my things into the supplied drybags, including my socks and zip-off trouser legs, I am expecting to get wet here.  In fact I get into the boat and move off without trouble, except that a veritable swarm of midges has turned up to feast on my exposed legs.  I frantically paddle towards the middle of the river, simultaneously slapping at the horrid things, eventually most seem to have gone, either squashed or sated, I itch like hell though.  Hmm, was supposed to join a group wasn't I?  To be honest, the guy who gave me the kayak wasn't sure when they'd arrive, or even that they were expecting me, so screw it.

Me, in a kayak, on the river.

Paddling along proves easy - it's twenty years since I was last in a kayak, but I recall it being simple enough.  What rapids there are don't trouble me, it is hardly white water, and I even manage to park the thing and put my legs back on.  This is rather fun I must say, the perspective on the landscape is new, and the Whanganui gorge is certainly impressive.  I could consider a longer trip in one of these.  This is supposed to take three days, according to both guide and hire firm.  Predictably I'm approaching halfway by 4pm, I reckon with an early start you could do it in a day.  Instead I camp by a nice little beach and proceed to build a large fire.  An Italian girl I met at Whakahoro paddles by, seems she found the two Americans she was joining there, and indeed a Canadian.  They're travelling at a more relaxed pace than me, still hike your own hike and all.  No sign of the big group I was meant to join.

Not the most accessible campsite ever.

The paddle goes well the next day too, must say it is nice not to have my pack on - light as it is after a long day the straps start to cut into me.  The morning flies by, soon enough I've only got ten kilometres to go, the only difficulty a section where a strong headwind made progress difficult.  I spot the group from yesterday moored up, really should say hi.  Except... how, and indeed why, did they moor here?  The riverbank slopes at about forty-five degrees, getting a foot on dry land is tricky, I just manage it then spot my paddle floating away, oops.  Step back on the kayak to grab it and, double oops, the boat capsizes and I'm in the river.  Joy.  They helpfully tie the thing up while I dry out, but that causes trouble too... stupidly I try sitting in the kayak when it's time to leave, but that makes it slide down the slope, the rope is too taut to untie, and the front of my boat is filling with water...

I get going in the end, but the thing is not the same, paddling forward it won't go in a straight line.  Of course this is because the front luggage compartment is full of water... OK, I manage to progress by turning the kayak around and paddling backwards, this gets me as far as a proper mooring where I can sort things out.  I catch the group up just before we reach Wanganui holiday park, time to get the tent up, find some beer and fish and chips.  My fellow hikers are going to camp on a Maori family's lawn, apparently this will be free.  Again, HYOH.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : National Park Village to Raetihi

KM this section : 89
KM completed : 1248

Horse sculpture on the way down to Whakahoro.

I certainly picked a good time to take a day off at National Park, as it rains pretty much all day.  At least it stops in time for me to head for Eivin's for dinner and beer - they seem to be giving me discounts too, could get used to this.  From here it's a long but easy walk downhill to Whakahoro on the Whanganui river, I've planned two days for this, but the going is so good that I make it in one, fifty-two kilometres, a new personal best I think.  There is even a cafe open at the end, at nearly 7pm this is a shock, but a cheese and ham toastie goes down very well.

From here I continue on the 'mountains to sea cycle trail', still easy going then, albeit with a six hundred metre ascent before heading back to the river.  Interesting though, this valley is where forty or so first world war veterans were settled, each with their own little parcel of land.  In the end, wresting a living from this isolated, steeply sloped gorge proved too much, and now there is little sign the men and their families were ever here.  As a sort of memorial, near the valley bottom is the impressive 'bridge to nowhere', a substantial concrete structure spanning the Mangapurua stream, with little more than a dirt track on either side.

Camped by the river.

Past the bridge, it's a short distance back to the Whanganui, I'm expecting to find a campsite here, and indeed I spot tents below me... but the path keeps going, still a long way above the water.  OK, maybe it doubles back... I walk on, eventually have the sense to check the GPS, oops - I'm a good four hundred metres away from the route.  Back I go, to where the path diverges from the GPX line, nothing.  Back upstream, check the map, no good... dammit, I can see people camped, so I yell at them, apparently I should keep on upstream.  A bit worrying that the camp seems to be on the other side of the river, but what can you do.  And they're right, in a new low for the official map, I walk fully five hundred metres further upstream before the path doubles back to the riverside, where there is, pretty much, nothing.

The Bridge to Nowhere.

The campsite is indeed on the far bank, here there is a sign explaining the history of the valley and not much else.  OK, the guide says this is a dead end for walkers, but I'd expected more than this.  Sigh.  The idea is that you get a canoe from here, however while I did try, no company seemed interested in bringing a canoe to this isolated spot for me.  Other trampers I've spoken to were skipping sections of the walk to get around this, e.g. by getting a canoe from Whakahoro, this is not for me.  So, I camp on a tiny patch of grass by the riverside, say hi to James and Mary-Kate when they paddle up the next morning, and walk back the way I came.  OK... I will phone from the high point of the track back towards Whakahoro, there was signal there yesterday... but today of course, there isn't.  Well I'm not carrying on walking north on the off chance of getting a canoe, so instead I detour off the route, taking the alternative 'mountains to sea' track via Raetihi.  Which proves a pleasant enough place, the same grid pattern and frontier town atmosphere as National Park.  I've walked around sixty additional kilometres from when I started backtracking, and still have thirty or so to go before rejoining the route, but what can you do.  For what it's worth, I'm aware of at least twenty hikers doing this section around now, and not one has done it the way the guide wants.

Totally worth walking to Raetihi for.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : Taumarunui to National Park Village

KM this section : 111
KM completed 1159

Camped by the 42 Traverse.

Taumarunui seems a little better the next day, at least I manage to get some shopping done, much food, a pie of course, and stuff to work on my troublesome tent pole - a hacksaw, some duct tape, it's as good as new.  For my second night at the campsite I upgrade to a cabin, real bed at last, and also make use of the BBQ - cooking and eating four cheeseburgers, one after another.  I don't think it too many.

I've planned short distances for the next couple of days, the route is mainly off road and remains 'alpine'.  But in fact, the '42 traverse' cycle track proves absurdly easy walking, on my first day I keep going 'til 6pm, at which point I'm at least six kilometres past my planned stop.  It's so nice that the next day I do a bit extra... in the sense of, miss the (unsigned) turn from the traverse and go three kilometres the wrong way.  Ho hum... well, it isn't just me, returning to the trail I meet a French chap who has done the same thing.  He's going by the trail name of Moonkid, and somewhat to my surprise asks if I'm Tim. Well, guilty... turns out some Americans, having read my entries in the log books of the various huts recently passed, were asking after me.  Suspect it is a bit of a disappointment when they finally meet me at around 5pm.

Emerald Lakes.

We reach a campsite together shortly after, it seems lazy to stop now, and indeed they're going to keep going.  I decide to call it a day though, I may still be sleeping in the tent but at least I can sit in the TV room for a bit first.  Until it turns out to contain a massive cockroach anyway.  Moonkid is here too, he has the same tent as me - and has had to buy a new pole for it.

From here I walk through a real highlight of the route, the Tongariro Alpine Crossing.  This involves an ascent of around a thousand metres, mostly up a well made path with magnificent views towards Lake Taupo.  I then make my way through an incredible volcanic landscape, there are lakes of brilliant blue and green - not for drinking thanks to the high mineral content - steaming vents, a mighty red crater, and looming above, the brooding dark cone of Mount Ngauruhoe, made famous as Mount Doom in the LOTR films.  I am slightly ashamed that I don't get to the top... it's a three hour detour off route, would likely mean walking until well past 9pm, as it is I get to Whakapapa for 6.30pm, time for beer... maybe.  The place has three licensed establishments according to my research, first up, a pub called the Tussock, is shut.  Well it is New Year's Day, what am I thinking.  Strike one.  The imposing Chateau Tongariro is open, but the girl there looks at me and says, dinner for residents only.  Hmm.  Strike two.  Thankfully, the Skotel (this being a ski resort) comes through, and I get a pizza with, it seems, the cured product of an entire pig on it.  Also pretty sure they give me several free beers, which is nice.

It's a short walk the next day to National Park Village, and a zero day next as well, I am so lazy.  Well, a chance to pile on some calories before continuing.  Odd little place, again a ski resort, given the lifts aren't here I guess it caters for those on a budget.  Works for me anyway, beer and food are available.

Me and Mount Ngauruhoe.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : Te Kuiti to Taumarunui

KM this section : 142
KM completed 1048

A beautiful Boxing Day morning.

Te Kuiti is pronounced 'tay quitty', but I'm not quitting just yet, it takes more than some lost pegs.  In fact I find everything I need in town, new pegs for four dollars from The Warehouse - I love The Warehouse - food for the next four days, and tasty mince and cheese pie and carrot cake for lunch.  The afternoon walk goes well, the Mangaokewa gorge is glorious, rivalling the best of the UK peak district, and the path is fine - somebody has even been along with a strimmer.  But as evening draws in, Te Araroa madness resumes.  I can handle the boggy bits, not pleasant and slow going though they may be.  But for long periods, the path climbs crazily away from the river, in the form of a narrow, sloping ledge of either wet grass or mud, along which I carefully pick my way in fear of tumbling down the slope towards the river below.  Eventually, several kilometres short of plan, I camp on a rare spot of flattish grass.  My tent pole snaps, again - it has broken four times now in various ways.  Funny way to spend Christmas eve... somehow I get the tent up anyway.

Wild camping in the woods.

Christmas day, and thankfully only a few kilometres of bush before an easy day of road walking.  I make short work of it, at Ngaherenga campsite for 6pm... there isn't a lot here.  Not even anybody to take my money, well I'm not putting a fifty dollar bill in the honesty box.  At least the tent goes up OK, and I enjoy a Christmas feast, there is cake, chocolate and biscuits, and then an early night, ready for an early start.  Turns out Te Araroa has a present for me after all, the walk up to the summit of Mount Pureora is a lovely one, on a gently graded and well made cycle track.  From the top of this, the first peak over one thousand metres on the trail, I get magnificent views of Lake Taupo, and even larger mountains to the South.  There is even phone signal so I call family back in England, it's still Christmas there.

This section is described by the guide as 'alpine', so, will there be grassy slopes, cows with bells on and singing nuns?  Or will there be horrible bush?  The way the guide suggests three to four days for just fifty-one kilometres implies the latter, but in fact it's OK, not too muddy and a lot of it is flat.  This high altitude forest has a different character, the undergrowth isn't as thick, and every tree has a root to leaf covering of moss.  The place seems ancient, and I do find myself expecting to enter a clearing and find a gathering of elves.  As it is I do at least find clearings in which to camp a couple of times, and emerge from the alpine section one hour into my third day.  Along the way I pass a number of nicely appointed Department of Conservation huts, and resolve to buy some tickets so I can stay at some of these.  Oh, and I pass the one thousand kilometre point, one third done!

One thousand kilometres.  See, I am making an 'M' with my fingers.

It's an easy and pleasant road walk into Taumarunui, highlight being some actual trail magic, courtesy of a young man named Sam who has set up a stall with ice water and free sweets for passing hikers.  You, sir, are a hero of the trail.  I reach town for 4:30pm, time for beer then, and, oh yes, a real bed at a motel.  Except, turns out not only does the wretched place have no pubs - three liquor stores and two big supermarkets, sure - but worse yet, every one of the town's numerous motels is full.  Why, or indeed why anybody would want to come here, I know not.  I walk a further three kilometres to a campsite, tent again, yay.  At least the nice campsite man (from Yorkshire!) has some beer to sell me.

In honour of the pegs incident (apologies to Jarvis Cocker) :

I lost my pegs, I walk alone,
It's eight o' clock, I want to go home,
But there's no way, not today,
So instead I call my mother,
And say,
'Mother, I have to go shopping again,
Because I've left an important part of my tent
Somewhere in a field in New Zealand.'

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : Hamilton to Te Kuiti

KM this section : 116
KM completed: 906

I rather like Hamilton, nice to eat some proper food, pizza, bacon sarnies, mince and cheese pie (sounds weird but it works), and a good meal with actual vegetables at the Londoner - they even have English beer on tap, bit pricey though.  I sit through half an hour of a nativity play, well it is Christmas.  Turns out the guy who invited me in (with promise of cake, which will get me anywhere these days) wants to talk about god, I have shopping to do though (and there was no cake, grr).

Eight hundred whole kilometres done.

I make a late start out of Hamilton, faffing around with breakfast and more shopping (new water filter, yay).  Many kilometres to do, easy enough to start with on roads that get increasingly minor as I go.  Honestly I'm not looking forward to leaving the road, it's going to be bush, and I am starting to, ah, have strong negative feelings about the bush.  But in fact something of a miracle occurs, I leave the road and walk onto a grassy hillside, then climb with turf underfoot and views for miles around.  This is how it is supposed to be.  I'm tempted to walk through to my planned campsite, but I won't get there 'til nine or so... a pleasant spot by a river will do nicely anyway, and if I now have a twelve hour day tomorrow, going by the guide, so be it.

One noticeable absence from the walk so far has been mountains, there will be plenty to come for sure.  Today is the first of any note, Mount Pironghia, at nine hundred and fifty-nine metres it doesn't quite hit the one thousand mark but it's big enough.  Just a pity it's bush all the way to the top, and indeed back down.  At its worst it's an utterly vile morass of sucking mud, and I'm actually doing worse than the two kilometres per hour the guide reckons.  Note to TA powers that be, 'utterly vile' is not the best phrase that could be used to describe your path.  Of course it is only me, your mileage may vary, etc.

Pahautea hut.

Well... next day I start from a random field, it's wet, there are of course bitey insects, and I am eight kilometres behind plan.  Off at 7am then... fortunately the plan was just a twenty-eight kilometre day, still lots of off-road, I am afraid.  But today, I get nice Te Araroa, more grassy hills and what bush there is, is OK.  Just a couple of flies in the ointment, first the bit where in the absence of any signage I follow the GPX line and end up standing, exactly on the line, facing an unsurmountable slope.  Hmm.  Had to walk through lots of bog to reach it too.  Well, I find my way around somehow.  More annoying because it is my own fault is when I stop for lunch, unpack the tent to dry it out, and realise I've left the pegs back in that random field, too much hurry to get going and away from the bugs I fear.  Good thing I'm at a proper campsite tonight, at Waitomo, where a lovely Canadian chap lends me some pegs.  Waitomo is in fact unexpectedly great, there are various drinking establishments, at one of which I consume a quite insane burger... it has steak on it.  And egg.  I feel a little better the next day, beer always helps, and the walking through farmland into Te Kuiti is easy enough.  It's just a lunch and resupply stop, but I need pegs too, and what will the afternoon bring?  Watch this space...

Photos to go with this post can be found here.

Te Araroa : Manukau to Hamilton

KM this section : 151
KM completed : 790

Looking down at the Wairoa reservoir.

So I made forty-five kilometres look pretty easy yesterday, things had to go downhill, and so : the bush is back.  Maybe the mud isn't so bad, but still, the thirteen kilometres or so of forest that caps the next day proves hard.  Have I mentioned how even when the ground underfoot isn't mud, it's often a tangled mass of roots so that you must pick every step or risk a trip or twisted ankle?  Did I speak of the tendrils of vine that snake across the path, hard as steel cable and ready to trip or tangle the unwary?  Occasionally the forest canopy parts and I get a view, but you know what?  I'd like a view while I'm walking, but even if there were one I have to watch my feet every step instead.  This is 'only' a forty-one day, but after twelve hours I'm still walking, will I make it to Wairoa dam where I plan to camp before dark?  Nearly... with a kilometre to go I reach a junction, orange triangles point both ways, no suggestion which is the Te Araroa route.  The GPX route I have from the official website says straight on... of course it is wrong.  Half an hour wasted and I walk down to the dam by the light of my headtorch.

More wild camping.

Only thirty-eight kilometres, haha, planned next day, trouble is the first fifteen or so are 'bush kilometres'.  I begin to suspect that not only has no real path been constructed through areas like this, but even the distance the marked route takes hasn't been measured.  Or maybe they think that switchbacks, detours around ravines etc. just don't count.  Anyway... I walk for four hours at what seems mostly a decent pace, maybe four kilometres per hour barring the odd tricky bit.  So, having stopped for lunch, it is with disbelieving horror that I find I've done less than eight 'official kilometres'.  I finally emerge from the bush after 4pm, with twenty-three kilometres still to do, well, at least I now have some flat, along roads and Dutch-style dykes.  A look at the guide suggests more of this tomorrow so I cut today's route short, still my second thirteen hour day on the trot though.

The Waikoto River.

The next day into Huntly is indeed easy going, more dykes and roads through the flood plain around the wide Waikato river.  Unbroken by the last two days I power through it to reach Huntly by 6.30pm... a real bed in a motel, yay!  But I'm gaining more respect for the trip times given in the guide, ridiculous though they seem at first.  So tomorrow there is a eleven kilometre bush section the guide reckons will take eight hours, meaning I have a fourteen hour walk to Hamilton, ugh.  But as it turns out, the Hakuna Matata, ah, sorry, Hakarimata Forest track takes me only four and a half hours, and is largely pleasant.  Lots of hikers here too, I chat to the usual mix of Germans and Americans, and even a Romanian today.  Another motel in Hamilton, such decadence, and for two nights, it is about time I had a 'zero day' - hiker terminology, a day of zero movement along the route.  Think I earned it.  Over a quarter done now!

Photos to go with this post can be found here.