Day 2 - Invercargill to Riverton - 34km, 7 hours.

The day started with more road walking - 10km of it from Invercargill to Oreti Beach. But with a wide runoff and no trucks, this was a much more enjoyable experience than yesterday, especially with an ice cream shop half way along.

Towards the end of the road I passed Terotonga raceway, where there was a round of the NZ V8 championship in progress. It sure sounded good, and I was more than half tempted to stop and watch for a couple of hours, but with the beach calling, and time and tide famously waiting for no man, I pressed on.

Also famous, in New Zealand at least, is Oreti beach itself. Home to national land speed records, including of course those of Burt Munro (since immortalised in the film The World's Fastest Indian), I had been wanting to check it out for some time. No so much for the land speed record stuff, but it holds another claim to fame. It's the best place to see Aurora Australis from mainland New Zealand, something that is definitely on my bucket list to do. To be honest, I'm hopeful I might catch a glimpse over the next two nights. The Aurora forecast isn't too promising - I can but hope.

As I approached the beach my enthusiasm dimmed somewhat.  Sand whipped across the road towards me and I had visions of 20+km of sand blasting.



My concerns were not realised however. What makes the beach good for land speed records saved me; hard packed sand with good, if windy walking and lots of beach to be had at dead low tide when I arrived on the beach.


Oreti beach is one long curve, and throughout the day I experienced a curious optical illusion where it appeared I was walking on a straight stretch, with a sharp curve in the beach a couple of kilometers ahead, a curve that would never be reached. 

After several hours of this, and a quick lunch with minimal shelter from the blasting winds (which had come around and were now directly in my face) up in the dunes, I realized that the tide was on its way back in. I wasn't too concerned, high tide at Bluff was 5pm, still 2 hours away. However I kept getting pushed higher up the beach into the soft stuff, and by 3.30 there was no beach left, at least any that could be navigated at any kind of pace.



It seems I had made a mistake, well actually 2 mistakes.
1. I had assumed Bluff's tide times would hold true for Riverton.
2. I should have come on the beach at mid tide while it was going out. This would have given me enough time to walk the length without being affected.


Fortunately there was a paper road just back from the beach, and after hacking my way through dune grass, a fair amount of gorse, a very effective wind break, and jumping over 3 electric fences (nervous times with my big, heavy pack) I started making progress again.


Coming back to the beach before Riverton, I eventually found an exit and hobbled into town, my feet somewhat the worse for wear after two very long days.  It's fair to say that I was pleased to see the back of the beach.

There was a somewhat embarrassing epilogue to the day. I went across to get (an excellent) pizza for dinner, came back to my room for a lie down, when I realised after some time that I had walked out of the restaurant without paying! Queue embarrassed scramble back across the road with profuse apologies.