January 9th- 12th Wanganui to Tararuas trailhead
This section comprises some of the dullest part of the trail so I'm going to summarize it instead of going through it day by day. It's roughly a hundred fifteen kilometers of road/beach walking which was brutal on the feet and body to walk on hot asphalt for that length of time.
We had our first experience with black sand on Turakina beach.
The beach was windy as usual and littered with logs that had been washed down from the Whanganui river. We camped in a forest a few hundred meters from an active logging area across the road. We were woken up quite early with a crash. Even from that distance the sound was deafening, which is good to know that we probably were unlikely to be killed by logging operations since we'd hear that miles before they'd get to us.
We met Gill along our road walk, both of us were getting a hitch at exactly the same time from two different drivers. At the point that we had hitched there was a lengthy diversion around the only nice Forrest section we could have walked through. Damn logging!
In feilding we camped like homeless people in the park, with the possibility of a $200 fine I'd rather not make it a habit. Apparently freedom camping used to be legal in NZ, but the tourist had a problem with not burying their feces in public parks-ew.
Cody treated me to a movie at the littlest, fanciest theater in Fielding. We saw the Water Diviner which was awesome.
After a lengthy road walk Gill, Cody, and I finally reached Palmerston North. The city was a lot bigger and nicer than I expected it to be. We took a zero day to resupply and then stayed the night at The New Railway Inn. Not to be confused with The Old Railway Inn which was the bar next door. We had a really nice stay and got to catch up with all the other TA hikers in town.
January 13th Palmerston North to the halfway mark.
To get out of Palmerston North we planned on skipping ahead to avoid some of the city and farmland walking that we had grown to really dislike. We missed about 16 kilometers of the TA by going up Scott road out of a tiny town called Linton. On the way up Scott road we saw this sign...hmm.
Our notes had told us the logging operations would be done last year. Either way we were going through so we pressed on. Around 4:30 we started seeing logging employees in trucks coming down the windy road heading towards home. Lucky for us we're going to get there just after quitting time. We finally made it to the logging site around 7 p.m. Cody's eyes lit up as he took in this golden opportunity ...they left all of their logging machines right next to the trail! One of them might have the keys inside. After a thorough search through all of the machines no keys were found. I don't think I've ever seen him more disappointed. But that didn't stop us from climbing all around the diggers and taking a few photographs.
We camped about a kilometer out from the logging site at the halfway mark in the the trail which was fairly nondescript; just a boundary between pine forest and native bush. This wasn't the halfway mark for us, we had planned to celebrate in Wellington which was the end of the North Island. And possibly the only place that we could find Mexican food which we were desperately craving.
Cody made an art out of stealth camping by adorning the tent with many fern leaves.
This was our view of the tent from the road, not as stealthy as we'd thought.
January 14th Halfway mark to Paradise on the Hill B&B.
We left camp and descended into the bush section of the trail which turned out to be a muddy, rooted, goat path typical TA trail standard for the North Island. After a few stream crossings we heard what sounded like a chimpanzee howling in the forest. It was just Gill' our most dedicated stalker coming down the trail. We had a good time catching up while walking through the valley enjoying the view of the mountains around a us. We were quite ecstatic not to be on top of the ridgeline. It was a real treat!
Otherwise the track was mostly uneventful. We ascended some mildly steep stuff that made us huff and puff, but for the most part it was an enjoyable track.
Cody had a cool idea to set up the gravity filter with trekking poles since there were no trees around.
Gil stopped before us on the track to setup camp and cuddle up with some sheep. We decided to continue onto Paradise on Hillside B&B. With a name like that how could we pass it up? We were also running low on food and I'd hoped to buy some bread from the lady running to the B&B instead of having to take a day off to hitch to the nearest town. As it turns out Stephany the owner of the b&b was a very warm and welcoming host. Allowing us to shower immediately (good call on her part) then she offered a sample of homemade goat cheese that she had milked from her own goats and a cup of tea. We had gotten to her house at around 8 so we ended up staying up pretty late just talking. It was then that I asked if I could buy any bread or eggs from her. Unfortunately she didn't have much that we could buy. But instead she offered to bake us bread at 10 at night. What a saint! She whipped out her cook book and pulled out a 30 minute bread recipe. We learned that the secret to making yeast rise quickly was to place a metal bowl of the yeast mixture in a sink of warm water. Cool trick!
In about 40 minutes the bread was out of the oven and cooling off on the table.
Before tucking into bed I battled a Huhu beetle which are twice as large as any normal cockroach and 3x as annoying. Apparently people eat the grubs...ew.
We went to bed buzzing with excitement, looking forward to the stretch of mountains (Tararuas) between us and Wellington.
This section comprises some of the dullest part of the trail so I'm going to summarize it instead of going through it day by day. It's roughly a hundred fifteen kilometers of road/beach walking which was brutal on the feet and body to walk on hot asphalt for that length of time.
We had our first experience with black sand on Turakina beach.
The beach was windy as usual and littered with logs that had been washed down from the Whanganui river. We camped in a forest a few hundred meters from an active logging area across the road. We were woken up quite early with a crash. Even from that distance the sound was deafening, which is good to know that we probably were unlikely to be killed by logging operations since we'd hear that miles before they'd get to us.
Coolest part of the forest trek-hedgehog!
We met Gill along our road walk, both of us were getting a hitch at exactly the same time from two different drivers. At the point that we had hitched there was a lengthy diversion around the only nice Forrest section we could have walked through. Damn logging!
In feilding we camped like homeless people in the park, with the possibility of a $200 fine I'd rather not make it a habit. Apparently freedom camping used to be legal in NZ, but the tourist had a problem with not burying their feces in public parks-ew.
Cody treated me to a movie at the littlest, fanciest theater in Fielding. We saw the Water Diviner which was awesome.
After a lengthy road walk Gill, Cody, and I finally reached Palmerston North. The city was a lot bigger and nicer than I expected it to be. We took a zero day to resupply and then stayed the night at The New Railway Inn. Not to be confused with The Old Railway Inn which was the bar next door. We had a really nice stay and got to catch up with all the other TA hikers in town.
Mr. GQ in his element
Cody gave Joss a replacement frisbee for the one he' d lost during the river trip. While we were at the store buying the frisbee we saw something odd... It was quite weird seeing New Zealand on the center of a world map; especially on a frisbee.
January 13th Palmerston North to the halfway mark.
To get out of Palmerston North we planned on skipping ahead to avoid some of the city and farmland walking that we had grown to really dislike. We missed about 16 kilometers of the TA by going up Scott road out of a tiny town called Linton. On the way up Scott road we saw this sign...hmm.
Our notes had told us the logging operations would be done last year. Either way we were going through so we pressed on. Around 4:30 we started seeing logging employees in trucks coming down the windy road heading towards home. Lucky for us we're going to get there just after quitting time. We finally made it to the logging site around 7 p.m. Cody's eyes lit up as he took in this golden opportunity ...they left all of their logging machines right next to the trail! One of them might have the keys inside. After a thorough search through all of the machines no keys were found. I don't think I've ever seen him more disappointed. But that didn't stop us from climbing all around the diggers and taking a few photographs.
We camped about a kilometer out from the logging site at the halfway mark in the the trail which was fairly nondescript; just a boundary between pine forest and native bush. This wasn't the halfway mark for us, we had planned to celebrate in Wellington which was the end of the North Island. And possibly the only place that we could find Mexican food which we were desperately craving.
Cody made an art out of stealth camping by adorning the tent with many fern leaves.
This was our view of the tent from the road, not as stealthy as we'd thought.
January 14th Halfway mark to Paradise on the Hill B&B.
We left camp and descended into the bush section of the trail which turned out to be a muddy, rooted, goat path typical TA trail standard for the North Island. After a few stream crossings we heard what sounded like a chimpanzee howling in the forest. It was just Gill' our most dedicated stalker coming down the trail. We had a good time catching up while walking through the valley enjoying the view of the mountains around a us. We were quite ecstatic not to be on top of the ridgeline. It was a real treat!
Found this old bottle hidden in a tree
Otherwise the track was mostly uneventful. We ascended some mildly steep stuff that made us huff and puff, but for the most part it was an enjoyable track.
Gil stopped before us on the track to setup camp and cuddle up with some sheep. We decided to continue onto Paradise on Hillside B&B. With a name like that how could we pass it up? We were also running low on food and I'd hoped to buy some bread from the lady running to the B&B instead of having to take a day off to hitch to the nearest town. As it turns out Stephany the owner of the b&b was a very warm and welcoming host. Allowing us to shower immediately (good call on her part) then she offered a sample of homemade goat cheese that she had milked from her own goats and a cup of tea. We had gotten to her house at around 8 so we ended up staying up pretty late just talking. It was then that I asked if I could buy any bread or eggs from her. Unfortunately she didn't have much that we could buy. But instead she offered to bake us bread at 10 at night. What a saint! She whipped out her cook book and pulled out a 30 minute bread recipe. We learned that the secret to making yeast rise quickly was to place a metal bowl of the yeast mixture in a sink of warm water. Cool trick!
In about 40 minutes the bread was out of the oven and cooling off on the table.
Before tucking into bed I battled a Huhu beetle which are twice as large as any normal cockroach and 3x as annoying. Apparently people eat the grubs...ew.
photo stolen from the internet
We went to bed buzzing with excitement, looking forward to the stretch of mountains (Tararuas) between us and Wellington.
No comments:
Post a Comment