A challenge presented itself at the end of the day when I approached a river mouth. I had made the decision not to take the detour but cross the river which would be possible at low tide. When I arrived it was 45 min after low tide. I rearranged my backpack in case it would get wet, took off my socks and trousers, and entered the river at the place that I was advised... The first part was okay, the water was up to my knees and while I kept walking I was making progress. And then it got deeper, and deeper.. up to my thighs. I felt my feet sinking deeper into the sand and the strong current around my legs. I was grateful to have my walking sticks for balance. I kept going until I lost balance for a second and almost fell. That was scary!! Not wanting to take any more risks, I turned around, and was offered a lift around the river by a friendle couple from Mangawai. I felt glad I had made a sensible decision.
Another difficult part was walking a few kms over the rocks at low tide. The only alternative was walking on the state highway which was not really an option. So I asked two different people about the tides and the possibilty to walk over the rocks. One of them said: 'Oh, it's not difficult at all.' So I left, and the first part was indeed not difficult, until I reached some parts with very slippery rocks and lots of slippery seaweed. It took me ages to cover a few hundred metres because of taking every step with care.
The landscape was constantly changing: beaches, coastlines with rocks, forrest, towns, some road walking etc.. Along the way I regurlary met people who came up to me, mentioning my big backpack, asking where I am going. Some offered me a place to sleep or some land to pitch my tent which was very kind. When I approached a river a local man got his rowing boat out and rowed me across to the other side.
It took seven days to walk the 193 km from Marsden point to Auckland. On average I walked 27 km a day. Fortunately the weather was not as hot as before, making the walk a bit easier. Also, by this time I had learned which things in my backpack were useful and which were useless, so my backpack had a right weight.
A physical update of what appeared and disappeared again during the past seven walking days:
- three new blisters
- red burning rash on upper legs (no idea why)
- bite of tick in upper leg (got it out)
- sunburn upperlegs
- neck: painful to turn my head to the left (after waking up one morning)
- lots of sandfly bites
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| On my own again... |
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| Walking across the rocks at low tide from Waiwera to Orewa |
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| Funny and beautifully shaped rocks |
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| I camped in a pristine little forrest. No one noticed I was even there except for the ducks and sheep... |
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| The trail... |
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| The ferry from Devonport to the city centre of Aucklnad |
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| YES!!! I made it to Auckland and the sun is shining :)) |
Half way the hike described above I took a wonderful break to spend some time visting Rotorua with Sjoerd. Rotorua is famous for its geothermal activity and has geysers and hot mudpools. I was amazed... We camped next to a river with boiling! water. Steam was rising up next to our tent. It was nice to soak in the thermal pools and in a natural hot pool in the forrest. My muscles relaxed again :)
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| Thermal park in Rotorua (I liked the flowers a bit more then the mudpools, hence no mudpools on this photo) |
Finally arriving in Auckland was a nice experience. The sun was shining and I enjoyed meeting up with a fellow hiker, Kenyon from Australia, who was on a few day recovery-from-blisters break. We compared gear, maps and shared stories.
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| My map (left) and Kenyons map.. Find the differences :) |
Time has flown by and I will not be able to reach Wellington before my flight back to the Netherlands. In Auckland I had a talk with myself about the next weeks (my last precious weeks in NZ). I enjoyed the past 600 km on the North Island very much, but the next part around Hamilton will be quite flat and might be quite boring...For this reason I decided to go back to the South Island.. surprise! surprise! Within a few weeks I hope to post here a next story about the first part of the Te Araroa trail of the South Island..
To be continued...
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| Back on the South Island.. Wow..... :) |
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