Post Walk Reflections

Our TA experience took us 116 days with 10 rest days. For a number of reasons this was spread over 10 months (the first 93 days December 2021 - March 2022 and the last 23 days in October 2022). Whilst we both would have liked to have done it all in one go with no interruptions, life (and my injury) got in the way. We were very lucky that we are based in New Zealand so stopping and starting again was a lot easier than for our international visitors. It also did not take long to get "back in the groove" once we did start walking again. 

Our last leg (Auckland to Cape Reinga) took us 23 days. We stretched this out a bit with a few very short days but we were in no rush to finish. I was very relieved to have no pain and no niggles on this stretch and I honestly would have been happy to just keep going and going. 

All that said, it was amazing to finish and having Anne and Chris meet us at the end was really special.

On the drive back home,  Anne and Chris asked a few really good questions and suggested that we included the answers in the blog.

For me...

1) What was your best day?

This is a tough question! I have decided to break it down in to three:

a) North Island SOBO

Day 39: Waikanae to Pukerua Bay 

and

Day 40: Porirua to Wellington CBD (who said I could not have two?) 

Both in the "Kapiti Coast and Wellington" section.

I was very pleasantly surprised at how beautiful the walk in to, and through, Wellington was. Just magic!

b) South Island SOBO

OK, so again I am going to have to choose two....or maybe three, four or five....six??

Day 50: Blue Lake Hut to Waiau Hut (In the "Waiau Pass (Nelson Lakes)" section)

Amazing views! Just beautiful. It was a long day and physically challenging but seeing Blue Lake followed by Lake Constance was all pretty special.

Day 58: Arthur's Pass to Hamilton Hut over Lagoon Saddle (In the "Arthur's Pass to Methven" section) 

I had stayed at Arthur's Pass before but had not realised how much beauty surrounded this very small, unassuming town.

The views from the Lagoon Saddle were fantastic. I kept stopping to look in bewilderment!

Day 66: Royal Hut to Camp Stream Hut (over Stag Saddle) (In the "Geraldine to Tekapo" section)

Verbally I have claimed this as my two favourite day of the whole walk. Looking through my notes again to write this, I still feel the same way. 

Day 72: Stody's Hut to Gladstone Reserve (via Breast Hill) (In the "Tekapo to Gladstone's Reserve" section)

This has often been described as my second best day. And yep, it still is! We are very lucky that this is going to be so close to our new home in Wanaka as I can see Breast Hill becoming a regular haunt for us both.

Day 76: Highland Creek Hut to Roses Hut (In the "Glendhu Bay to Queenstown (mostly over the Motatapu Track)” section)

Even when I wrote about it in the blog, I listed this day as in my "top five faves". Again, really excited to have it so close to our new home. I can definitely see us walking or running the Motatapu track again.

Day 84: Aparima Hut to Telford Campsite (In the "Te Anau to Birchwood" section)

The forests got a bit tedious but breaking out of the trees on the Takitimu Range and seeing the 360 views was staggering.

c) North Island NOBO

Day 8: Ruakaka to Ocean Beach (over Bream Head) (In the "Northland: Pakiri to Whananaki" section)

We have run over Bream Head before but it was great to be able to take our time and really take in the views.

2) What was your worst day?

Let's keep this in perspective....none of them were that bad really but some were tougher than others.

a) North Island SOBO

Day 24: Kaitieke Monument to Whakahoro (In the "National Park to Whanganui River" section). 

This is the day we were told that Roger's mum (Maggie) had passed away. This was, of course, our saddest and toughest day emotionally. But I don't think that was what Anne meant by her question so I will start again...

Day 37: Nichols Hut to Parawai Lodge (In the "Tararua Ranges section)

This was a pretty tough day. It had the potential to be a great day with amazing views but the weather was not on our side. We summited Mt Crawford but had NO VIEWS at all. 

The rest of the day just got worse and worse. Not only was the track horrendous, we then spent an hour trying to find the hut (which was only about 1km away) and to top it all off, there were so many mosquitos in the hut that Roger got up in the middle of the night, put the tent out on the deck and moved out there!

b) South Island SOBO

Day 83: Te Anau to Aparima Hut (In the "Te Anau to Birchwood” section)

I did not dwell on it too much in the blog at the time but on this day I did not take any anti-inflammatories or pain killers (to see if I could do it without them) and I found the whole day really tough. There was a lot of swearing to myself going on that day! 

c) North Island NOBO

Day 5 (of going NOBO): Dome Cafe to Pakiri Beach (In the "Auckland to Pakiri" section)

Not much to say really - it was just a horrible track!

Roger's best and worst to follow. I know Day 84 was also one of his but don’t want to second guess them. 

3) What was your "luxury" item and what did you do without?

Most walkers have a "luxury" item which they carry, despite the weight. 

When we left Auckland the first time, I never thought that within a few days I would be ditching some real basics:

- kindle (yes, it would be nice to read but what was I thinking??)

- crosswords (I hear meditation is a good time filler) 

- paper and spare pens (was I planning on writing a memoir whilst out there?) 

- washing powder (OK, you can buy that as you go, not a big deal)

- dishwashing liquid (quick cold water rinse of pans and bowls seemed to get us by until we reached the next town) 

- moisturiser (so what if I looked like a lizard after a week?)

- hairbrush/comb (a baseball cap covers a multitude of sins)

- deodorant (this was a big decision! I never thought I would go months without using deodorant but it is amazing how quickly you get used to it. And, to be honest, there were days when our clothes and our bodies smelt so bad anyway that I don’t think it would have made much difference!) 

- shampoo (I had some most of the time but when I didn’t then a bar of soap pretty much did the same job) 

- extra clothes (I took a whole load out in Hamilton and was left with 2 sets of underwear and 2 pairs of socks. However I did treat myself to a third pair of knickers in Palmerston North!) 

So they were the things I ditched. What did I keep that I probably did not need to? What was that “luxury” item?

This may sound weird, but it was a SKIRT! A good friend who does a lot of hiking and multi-day bike rides suggested I took one as it made getting changed in huts and campsites so much easier.  

I have to admit it was great to have! Possibly slightly heavier than a second pair of shorts but it was quick drying and so handy. It also meant I did not feel quite so scruffy when we went out for dinner in towns along the way. 

For Roger….

The good and the bad of the TA?

It’s not that easy to answer that question. Every day had good and bad.

Every day was generally physically tough: steep terrain (up and down), tree roots, mud, soft sand, long days – generally around 6 -7hrs minimum but up to 13 hrs (Day 37), often hot, lack of water, too much water ie: adding to too much weight to carry. 

Generally, however, the physical tough finished within minutes of taking our packs off and the often wet shoes off once we arrived at our hut or other accommodation for the night.

Every day had challenges: sandflies, mosquitos, the weather, the tide!! Traffic on the busy road sections, lack of traffic on the back roads when we were trying to hitch, the odd blisters, knocks, falls, jabs from branches, cuts from Toetoe, jabs and scratches from gorse, blackberry (way worse than gorse), my allergy to long wet grasses - my legs would come out in a spotty itchy red rash, lack of trail markers and the occasional getting lost – through lack of trail markers or missed ones, tree falls requiring detours, slips requiring often very steep detours (up and down).

The weather was generally very kind to us, not too hot, not to cold and clear on most of the high points where we wanted the big views  – but a few times we did get extremes – Snow overnight on the 9^th of February (Zero Day, # 55, Hurunui #3 Hut) (6°C in the hut), the extremely cold start from Comyns Hut (Day 63) wading/clambering up the Round Hill Creek valley with multiple stream crossings until we finally reached the warming morning sun. My feet and legs were so cold from all the water crossings that they were aching.

                

      

The hottest days were probably from Owhango to Tongariro Holiday Park (Day 20) and from there to Whakapapa Village (Day 21) via the Tongariro Crossing – it would have been over 30°C - not so bad if you are at the beach relaxing but damn hot if you have heavy packs and are climbing up and down steep, difficult terrain.

             

     

Our first five days out of Auckland were in my mind the toughest, mentally mainly – even though we were day packing for those 5 days – as the trail had not been walked on for ages due to the COVID lockdown and a lack of international trail walkers (in fact a lack of any trail walkers ahead of us – we started our trip south 3 days before the Mercer border opened). Trails were unused and overgrown making it very hard to follow/find markers and this also made it physically difficult. In addition to that, it rained pretty much every one of those days, so we were often wet and shoes and socks were continuously wet. The long, wet grass we found ourselves often bashing through meant my legs were a mess with a very itchy red rash.

           

          

We were also TA Trail newbies so we did not have the benefit of TA trail experience – the TA trail has its own foibles, particularly in the North Island where many of the trails have been set up specifically for the TA ie: they are not old DOC trails. DOC trails are generally well used, wide, graded and reasonably well maintained. TA trails having been made by volunteers, are often on difficult terrain and don’t get the same level of maintenance attention. This meant a much higher level of attention was required looking out for signs of the trail, trail markers and required use of the GPS based TA Trail App often when lost – or temporarily unsure of our position! And the App was not as accurate as we would have liked and in a few cases was in fact wrong both in terms of where the trail was shown to go and the description of the same. So, a reasonable bit of back tracking was required over the first week or two, with associated frustrations.

Other tough days: Physically tough ie: big hills, mud and roots generally didn’t bother me too much. (Just take an HTFU pill and get on with it !!) But we did have one particularly hard day in the Tararuas – as they included multiple challenges – pretty much everything mentioned in my intro. This was one of the few times the weather was not on our side – the peaks were shrouded in cloud, so we didn’t get the big views. Mud, tree roots, long ups and downs, massive slips to detour up around, and spending a good (no, bad) hour not being able to find Parawai Lodge (not as ritzy as that sounds) at the end of a very long 13-hour day (Day 37), topped off by a hut full of mosquitoes forcing me to set up the tent on the deck outside for the night.

Our last 4 days were also tough – more so mentally that physically – these were our last NOBO days up 90 Mile Beach and over to or finish point at Cape Reinga. We knew that 3x 30km (odd) days on a long beach would be hard. My biggest concern would be getting bad blisters making travel painful and unenjoyable as we had heard/read many hideous stories of feet so bad that TA’s would give up on the TA all together or end up in hospital/have to have a week off to recover from them. Especially hard for those SOBO’s just starting out and lacking trail experience – knowing what to wear on their feet, how to lighten up packs, etc. and having experienced long days of physically and mentally tough walking. We had the benefit of having all that experience behind us. Nevertheless, the mental game was a tough one. As it turned out, I only got a couple of relatively minor blisters which I could manage and that were not too painful. As far as the mental game – I needed to distract myself for about 6 hours a day over the 3 days walking up the beach – a bit hard to do when there is not a lot of change, but I did make it a challenge to try and find interesting objects on the beach, big and small to include in my photos of our journey and in our blog. Tenting at the end of 2 of those days added to the challenge, especially at the end of 90MB, when overnight we had the biggest downpour and thunderstorm we had experienced on our whole TA journey – and the first real test of the tent. We and the tent stood up to that, but I suffered for a few weeks after from the bites of dozens of Mozzies that somehow got into the tent overnight!!! The mozzies and their bites were much more unbearable than blisters.

     

The best days:

For me, breaking out at the top of the Takitimu Range (Day 84): a) to give us our first glimpse of the penultimate section of our journey – the Longwood forest, the south coast at the bottom of the South Island and, in our minds, a view of Bluff b) spectacular views of the surrounding high country peaks bathed in a warm evening light all around us and c) below us, the most spectacular open scenery (having been cloaked in forest all the way up to the peak) which consisted of a sculptural graveyard of grey, gnarly old tree stumps (Totara?) set amongst beautiful alpine ground cover plants – Hebes, alpine daisies, Dracophyllum and more - I couldn’t stop myself saying “Wow, wow, wow!!” and had to stop often on our descent to take photos, of the alpine scene around us, the many amazing sculptural tree stumps and the beautiful plants.

Interestingly, and as noted in my preamble, the day began tough, had this great highlight, and then had a tough finish of having to camp amongst a billion sandflies on a basic tent site with only a long drop. Such were almost every day of the TA – the highs and lows.

 A few other highlights were:

·         Our trek from Blue Lake Hut (Nelson Lakes area, Day 50), past Blue Lake and then a traverse above and beside the spectacular Lake Constance (1338m ASL) and up over Waiau Pass (1870m) – we could not have had a better day – a cool, crisp start with misty valleys and beautiful clear blue skies. And our lunch stop at the saddle of Waiau Pass was rewarded with a spectacular view of the Waiau valley cloaked in a blanket of low cloud. I regarded this section of our TA journey as on par with, if not better than the Milford Track and McKinnon Pass!! – truly sublime scenic beauty.

·         Reaching the summit of Mt. Pureora (on the Timber Trail, Day 15) on another spectacular cool, calm, crisp, blue-sky day with amazing 360° views including Lake Taupo, the Central Plateau volcanoes, Mt Taranaki and more.

·         A similar, spectacular day on the Tongariro Crossing (Day 21) when we could see both the end of East Cape and West Cape (Mt Taranaki) from the high point.

·         To be escorted by a pod of half a dozen dolphins as we started our first day up 90 Mile Beach. (Day 20 NOBO). They jumped out of the water, surfed on waves and kept us entertained for about half an hour on a beautiful sunny day.

·         The spectacular views and weather as we made our way south from Porirua to Wellington City (Day 40) climbing the peaks of Colonial Knob and Mount Kaukau on our way with spectacular views all around including the Tararuas from recent days past, the wind turbines of Makara Peak and the South Island mountain ranges beyond.

There are too many more to mention here (see our trail notes for others) – spectacular scenery (micro and macro), the amazing people encountered along the way, and our general good fortune that have together made our Te Araroa journey a truly fantastic and memorable experience. We are very, very lucky to have been able to experience it together. 

Roger's Luxury Items? 

Pics Peanut Butter Slugs and condensed milk in a tube!

Back to Kerstie....

I have been delaying finishing this blog as it marks the end of this incredible experience. There is so much more both of us could write but I think now is a good time to sign off. I would just like to thank family & friends (Scott, Rachel, John, Sherwin, Evan, Linda, Sharon, Jason, Bevan, Di, Tim, Saskia, Arjan, Anne, Chris, Richard, Nicky and Charlie) and Denis Stanton from the Te Araroa Trust, the Trail Angels, our fellow walkers, shuttle drivers, accommodation providers and all the people who gave us lifts (when we hitched) for all their support and hospitality as we made our way down (and up) the country. We could not have done it without you and we loved seeing old friends and making new ones.