Day 3 - Riverton to Colac Bay, 14km, 4 hours 40 minutes

I started the day having a leisurely breakfast, chatting with a fascinating couple who were sharing the backpackers with me.
They'd had a custom 4 person recumbent tandem built for them, and used it to tour the South Island. We chatted about this a fair bit, got into their tramps down on Stewart island, and some epic sea kayaking adventures around the Marlborough Sounds. Pretty cool, but whole other level given that the guy is totally blind. An inspiring couple it was a pleasure to spend time with.


Somehow we got onto the topic of skinny dipping. I brought out my best tale in this respect - swimming with Karen for 30 minutes at the base of the Maruia falls (I know, I know; it's dangerous - we were young, stupid, and a lot skinnier back then!). In any case we had a great time having the river to ourselves for such a long time... until we eventually realised there was a viewing platform at the top of the falls, with a bus load of tourists on it!
My new friends promptly trumped this story with an even better one. They were skinny dipping down on Stewart island and had hopped out to dry off, when they were surprised by an angry bull seal who came steaming out of the water then promptly settled down on their discarded clothing, and would not be moved. An already dire situation deteriorated further when a tourist launch pulled up at their little beach. Truly a tale even Crumpy would have been proud of!

In any case, back to the walking.
I had a nasty shock in the morning while examining my foot taping, to discover a 10 cent sized blister on my left heel.


Managing my feet was always going to be one of the most challenging aspects of this adventure, but it was quite perturbing to have such a nasty blister so early. In fact after 80km of very hot road and beach walking, my feet were in a bit of a sorry state, with a bruise forming under the heel of my right foot too.

In any case, with some careful plastering and taping, the heel blister didn't bother me unduly throughout the day, although the bruise became worse.

The walking started with a mostly easy climb of 200m up to and through Mores reserve. This is another heavily trapped and consequently stunning reserve on the outskirts of Riverton, with views over much of my trail for the past couple of days and bird life rarely seen on the mainland. Having only a lazy 14km to do on the day, I took time out to enjoy the view before carrying on.

The path down to Colac Bay was exceedingly overgrown with hen Fern and gorse, though fortunately recently thwacked.
It was on my way down here that I bumped into my first SOBO. We spent 5 minutes chatting, with lots of good tips exchanged about the upcoming track. I was told to be careful of electric fences strong enough to bring down a horse, and put in the know about a recently opened section of track that will benefit me in a few days, along with a warning about a lack of water throughout pretty much the rest of Southland.

Continuing on, I dropped down to some truly spectacular coastline, with never ending sets of huge southern ocean breakers rolling into the shore. Truly a surfers paradise!



I carried on up and over numerous headlands, with a bit of basic route finding over the cliffs to spice up an already interesting route. Some of the headlands required pushing through thick flax thickets, a difficult job resulting in a couple of tumbles, my feet not being visible.


In one bay there was a fascinating meter square cave, with breakers literally blowing through it to wash up at my feet. It made for some great video.

Eventually I dropped down to the Colac Bay beach, surely one of the best surf beaches in the country.



I'm going to hang around here tomorrow to enjoy the surf, my last view of the sea for awhile, and to allow my sorry feet to recover somewhat.

PostScript for the day. It's 11pm. There's a very drunk, obnoxious guy outside my room asking his wife to roll a smoke for him, coz he's too far gone to do it. His wife is refusing. His mates are trying to convince him to go to bed, doing the right thing by everyone else in the camp.
Mate: Markus, go to bed.
Markus: (unintelligible) whoop, rrrrrrrrr
Mate: Markus, you have a beautiful woman in there, go have sex with her.
Markus: I'm too drunk to get it up.
Mate: Sorry mate, I can't help you with that.
Markus: Why not?

Stay classy Markus!

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.

Day 1 - Bluff to Invercargill - 39km, 7.5 hours

I'm a night owl, a habit that was reinforced by years of studying late at night, and has been hard to break out of.
So enforced early morning rises with the dawn light streaming through the tent walls or through hut windows will be interesting.  To be truthful I'm quite looking forward to the opportunity to break out of not feeling the need to sleep until the small hours.  Certainly I'm expecting to be tired enough much of the time to have no issues getting to sleep earlier.
In any case today I had an opportunity to preview how that might all go with a 5.45am alarm call to catch a 6.30 bus to Bluff. Alas, this was all to no avail, with the bus company forgetting to actually pick me up, then promising me a bus close to lunch time, which would have me trudging back into Invercargill about 9pm. Some scrambling around was done, alternative plans put in place, and I wound up in Bluff an hour or two later than anticipated.

On the upside, while waiting for the bus I discovered my hotel abuts Pork Pie Lane. I know that movie finished down here, but I'm wondering if that actual lane is featured in the movie, or it's just Tim Shadbolt with some of his clever marketing. [Edit. The new pork pie movie ended with the car being burnt out here]

Having made Stirling Point I set off West around the bottom of Bluff Hill. Within 200 meters there was a track haring off up the hill, which I gave serious consideration to, before deciding it wouldn't do to go off the trail literally within a couple of minutes of starting.

Bluff Hill is gorgeous! It's a volcanic isthmus jutting out from the mainland, and as such can be easily blocked off to predators. There has been an extensive trapping program to support this, with spectacular results. Bird life such as rarely seen on the mainland, most especially tui, one of my favourite birds.

I had been surprised to see the bush, given the exposure to southerlies that must occur on such a promonentry, and sure enough the bush soon gave way to scrub to sea level - the hill itself must have been sheltering the bush further east.

The tide was ripping out of Bluff harbour spectacularly close to the shore and, given I will shortly be leaving the sea behind for 1200km, I stopped to watch - not the place for a swim though!

Shortly hereafter was my second rude surprise for the day, with the coastal route closed (it was listed as such on the TA website, but I had forgotten). I wasn't particularly displeased by this, it gave me the opportunity to climb Bluff Hill after all, a short, sharp climb of 250m. As I suspected spectacular views were to be had at the top, along with a family of Sydney-siders arguing over which way North was (for the record, the dad was 180 degrees in the wrong direction).


Dropping down over the other side of the hill, I stopped in Bluff itself for an iceblock, before motoring (not literally I should stress!) off along the dreaded SH1, trying to make up the extra 3km the detour over the hill had added to an already long day.

I ended up spending most of the day walking SH1. Every minute or two a logging truck would whiz past within meters at 100km/h.  Although there was often a makeshift trail beside the road, I was pleased I had brought a highvis vest specifically for this section.

After 10km I started developing hotspots on my feet, more of the blister kind than the wireless internet kind (sorry - dad joke) so stopped to strap my feet. It was here that I had a pleasant surprise when another NOBO (te araroa northbound Walker, a SOBO is of course southbound) sauntered up. We chatted while I strapped. It turns out she had been on the 6:30 bus that had missed me, along with another NOBO who had disappeared up the road and was presumably half way back to Invercargill by now (Post walk note: I subsequently found out this person was Neil, of whom you will read much more on this blog - we ended up walking at least half of the South Island together). Valuable information, as it gives some indication as to how busy the huts may be further on.
Continuing on we walked together for awhile. I obliged by taking photos of her with sheep (She was  Cornish, I thought they had sheep there?). In any case we split after awhile as she took photos of yet more sheep, and I was soon well up the road ahead.

The whole Bluff to Invercargill section didn't provide a lot of shade. Actually scratch that. Provided no shade, and with the day heating up I was forced to soldier on with no breaks. This resulted in good progress, and when I was eventually forced to stop for lunch I had covered 18km in 4 hours walking, including over Bluff Hill.

There was little else of interest along the state highway, apart from one exceedingly narrow rail overbridge, which I reccied carefully before running over, grateful of my small day pack.

Eventually all bad things must come to an end, and I ducked off onto an estuary walkway close to Invercargill, where at least I was off the road, but at this point the day really started heating up, and probably got close to 30.


Coming into the outskirts of Invercargill I found my first tree since Bluff Hill and collapsed gratefully into its shade for some R&R.
At this point Karen called - I really enjoyed the normality of chatting like I was home and made a mental note to always have my cell off flight mode when in coverage. She presented the excellent idea of going back to my hotel via the Invercargill pool.

Post swim a 1km jaunt saw me back where I started the day, at the Grand.

Back home the boys and I often go dirt kart racing. This is awesome fun, but every time we go the fastest lap always comes in the first lap or two because they haven't had a chance to turn the water on yet which sends the karts into sideways powerslides.  My first day on TA has been rather the same. No pack, road walking and sand shoes had seen me cover an amazing 39km in 7.5 hours, a rate unlikely to be repeated for the remainder of my walk, given a good tramping speed is 3km/h.


Interesting facts for the day:
Road kill count 7
Discarded fishing gloves on roadside count 5.

Day 0 - Christchurch to Invercargill

I've never been good at goodbyes.
When I used to travel to Mexico there were always a few tears, and it's the same this time around.  Don't get me wrong, I'm really looking forward to it, but the goodbye this time has been harder with emotions already at very raw edge from Caleb's death.



Plus side.  I see Elijah and Stephen in two weeks, and it will be awesome walking a section with them.  Also it's only 6 weeks until I get back to the Rakaia River and get back home for a few days, which is only 2 weeks longer than my longest work trips to Mexico when the kids were younger.

I've written this first bit sitting in the airport waiting lounge.  Right on queue they've just started playing, "can't live if living is without you" on the canned music system.  Thanks Christchurch airport; perfect going away music.  I'm surprised there aren't people jumping off the roofs.
Anyway after the dreaded, "please see an Air New Zealand representative" on checking in (queue visions of cancelled flights; it turns out they were just trying to fit me in on an earlier flight which turned around when unable to land in Invercargill anyway - I hope my flight has better luck), I have a seat booked on the right hand side of the plane.  This should give good views towards the route of the trail.  I'm particularly looking forward to checking out the Longwood forest and the Takitimus, two areas I am totally unfamiliar with and will be tackling early on.

My spirits started lifting as the flight rolled out.  This is the culmination of a year's planning and preparation, and a lot of hard work.  I'm really looking forward to it!

Low cloud in Southland meant there were no views of the early trail to be seen, but at least my flight got in, unlike the previous one, and I'll get a good enough look at everything in the coming days!

Having successfully completed my first navigational challenge of finding my way out of the airport carpark, I was left with a quick 4km jaunt to the Grand Hotel.  This indeed has a rather grand exterior, but conversely is equally tired internally.  Nevertheless, a fine place to lay my head for the next two nights, being directly downtown.  The walk was a fine opportunity to feel the pack on my back before the real deal starts in two days time - the first day being packless from Bluff back to Invercargill.  The pack was comfortable, but certainly wasn't light.  I'm not too concerned by this though - it was loaded up with heavy tramping boots and stuff I'll be leaving behind after day 1.

Gear, gear, gear

Tomorrow is Day 0 (travelling to Invercargill, but not walking from Bluff until the next day).

So what gear do I have? 

That's pretty much all of it.

It's a mix of tried and tested, and new gear bought because it's a better fit for a long walk.
Originally I had intended to tramp with a pack which when fully loaded would have touched 30kg.  Having bumped into and talked to numerous people on my trial walks who have walked te araroa, there was one piece of advice every single one of them gave me:

Every gram counts!

So I have recently undergone a process of whinnying down what I am taking, and replacing heavy over-specced equipment with lighter weight options.  This has got me down to a base weight (without food and water) of ~16kg, with ~6kg in food for 12-14 days, and a couple of kilos for those dry sections where I'll need to carry a lot of water.  Not accounting for damp and wet gear (which quickly adds to the weight), this gives a tramping weight of 23-24kg maximum - noting that I won't always need to tramp with the maximum allocation of food and water.  Given I'm used to tramping with kids, this will feel featherweight to my shoulders - although perhaps not after a couple of weeks!

So here's a (rough) list.

• 90 litre pack.  An old Kathmandu unit - there aren't many packs around this big, and a pack breakage is the last thing you want.  So this is a big, old, heavy unit I've used for years and can trust implicitly.
• 2 man Macpac tunnel tent.  This was one of the first things I upgraded for the track - my old tent is a 3 man, weighing 4kg+; this new one comes in about 2kg.  I could have saved a lot of weight here by going with a 'coffin' tent or bivvy bag, but I want to be comfortable while waiting for rivers to go down so I'm not tempted to cross prematurely, so have upsized.
• Inflatable half length ground mat
• 2 x walking poles.  A bit of thought was given to only taking one, but I find they help to prevent jarring of my back while descending hills.
• Electronics.  Ironic given this trip is a break from IT, I'm taking a lot - it'll all be stored in dry bags.
• Cellphone - also acting as my mapping system and GPS (I'm not taking any maps)
• Suunto watch - to track my walking and also to provide emergency GPS location if something happens to my phone
• Kindle - contains backups of route descriptions, again in case something happens to the phone, and lots of books!
• Satellite phone - I'll be using this to report my location every evening so Karen can see I'm OK.  Jakob will also be posting these locations to my facebook in case you want to see where I am.
• Waterproof camera.  I'll generally be using my phone as a camera - this is more a backup than anything.
• USB Rechargeable head torch
• 10000mah battery as a powerpack to charge everything off
• 7w solar charger that will sit on the top/outside of my pack and recharge the powerpack as I walk on fine days.
• Recharging cables
• 240v USB adapter for when I'm in a town
• PLB (personal locator beacon)
• Clothes
• Gortex jacket
• 2 x merino top base layers.
• 1 x full length merino top
• 1 x collared merino t-shirt
• 1 x windproof vest
• 1 x lightweight down jacket (for hut/tent use, pillow at night, auxiliary sleeping bag warmth when cold)
• 1 x long sleeved shirt (to keep the sandflies/mozzies off at night
• 1 x pair tramping shorts
• 1 x togs (I'm planning to swim a lot)
• 1 x long lightweight trousers (again to keep the insects off)
• 3 x underwear (technical, moisture wicking etc)
• 1 x thermal leggings
• 2 x pairs technical tramping socks (merino mix)
• knee length gaiters
• tramping boots.  These are fairly heavy duty - lots of te araroa walkers use trail shoes, but I think that's nuts given some of the terrain
• Lightweight gloves
• Warm hat
• Lightweight teva sandles.  Hut/tent footwear.  Again a recent purchase - I was going to go with crocs, but at 300 grams these are almost as light, and can also function as auxillary walking footwear if I have an issue with my boots.
• Expedition sunhat (one of those one's with a flap to protect my neck)
• Net hat (It makes me look like a total dweeb, but sure keeps the insects out)
• High-vis vest (for the day one walk Bluff to Invercargill - will biff it after that)
• Old shoes (again only for day one, Bluff to Invercargill)
• Really old day pack (again, only for day one. I'm leaving my large pack in Invercargill).
• Pack liner.  Also can function as emergency bivvy bag
• 3 season sleeping bag.  Recently bought to take instead of my ~2kg 4 season bag.  This one is ~700 grams and is using newly developed waterproof down (it'll give warmth even if it gets wet).  The 4 season bag is too warm to use 95% of the time in summer.  If it gets cold, I'll use my down jacket as an auxiliary second bag.
• Silk sleeping bag liner.  This is to either sleep on top of using my bag as a duvet, or to sleep inside using my bag as a mattress, depending on temperature.
• Pillow case.  I'm soft.  So shoot me.  I'll be filling this with my spare clothing at night.  A down jacket makes a fabulously soft pillow!
• Smallish pot
• Cup.   Note, no plate - I'll be using the pot for this.
• Titanium spork.   (plus a plastic backup in case I lose it)
• Lightweight knife (thanks Eli!)
• Titanium propane burner
• 2 x 250gram propane cannisters (for what I'm doing this should last 2 weeks.)  If I'm not happy with my gas usage I'll put in a third before I get to the really long sections.
• 2 x 1.5 liter bottles
• 1 x filtered 500ml bottle (so I can use water from doubtful sources)
• 1 x hip belt - will store the 500ml bottle and some food as I walk so I can drink/snack without having to stop
• Food
• Porridge for breakfast
• Soup/noodles/dehydrated/pasta for lunch
• Dehydrated for dinner
• Salami
• Carrot
• 300ml cream (this'll only last a few days but will be great for porridge, coffee)
• Hot drinks assortment
• Brown sugar, salt, pepper
• Raro sachets (if I'm having a low energy day and feel like a pep up)
• Museli bars
• Cashews.  Lots of cashews.
• Banana chips
• Biscuits
• Dehydrated loo paper (it's a thing, look it up).  Thanks Anna!
• Soap slivers
• Pot scrub
• Quick-dry towel
• Sunglasses
• Sunscreen lotion
• Dimp
• Monoscope (for spotting track markers)
• First aid kit (recently greatly augmented, thanks Colleen!)
• Medicine.  Largely to keep my back going (anti-inflammatories, along with acid neutralising tablets, because voltaren is terrible for your stomach), panadol, anti-histamines, anti-biotics. 
• Tape for protecting my feet from blisters
• Emergency repair stuff.  Sewing needles, twine, boot laces, spare straps

Man that's a lot of stuff when you write it all down!

Preparation!

Getting close to the big off, so how well prepared am I?

To be honest, I don't know, but is it possible to feel well prepared for something like this?

Gear wise I'm good.  I have a mixture of trusted, well used gear, with newer gizmos where what I had wasn't fit for purpose for a long trek.  I'll post separately on my gear closer to the off.

Physically I'm not so happy.  My intention was to start in better nick (aka lighter and fitter) than I currently am.  Oh well, at least I have some good stores of energy available to burn off!
As it is I've been doing a lot of walking to get myself tramping fit - mainly day trips up Canterbury mountains; Oxford, Thomas (many times) with some longer climbs thrown in to places like Mt Peel. 
Also lots of day walks of a longer duration, up to about 20km, and some hard weekend tester tramps thrown in with 25km days or hard climbing.
The thing is I haven't put it all together; multiple 20km+ days with a 30kg pack.  Ideally I'd have liked to have gone out for a week somewhere, but never mind - I have done so before, just not for a few years.

I'm sure I'll be tramping fit within a week or two of starting.

So why and why now?

My sister-in-law is walking the Compostela de San Tiago in March.  She recently posted a rather thoughtful and excellent defence of her walk here:
http://mylongroadtosantiago.blogspot.co.nz/2017/11/is-it-really-ok-to-run-away-from-home.html
I'm going to shamelessly rip her off, although doubtless with less eloquence.

So why would I choose this moment, in my early 40's with 2 teenage kids, to do something so self absorbed as walking for 3 months?

Given my age it would be tempting to think it's a mid life crisis thing.  A trampers equivalent of buying a Porsche or a Harley.  Turning 40 was weird for me (I've always considered I would be happy to live to 80, but wouldn't want to live much past that point, so I'm half way!), but I've got over that; definitively it is not a mid life thing.

When the trail was first mooted I paid attention, and once the route was firmly fixed in 2011 I made it a long term goal to do it, perhaps in my early 60's, or if I was fortunate a little earlier when the kids had left home.  Karen would take the time with me, and drive as support between the various trail heads (incidentally this is now the plan for the North island part of the trail).

However as the years went by, the need to do the trail became more pressing.  Once you have a big idea like this it is difficult to let it go; certainly completing it sat in the back of my mind.

Additionally I have been suffering from burnout at work.  I find I need a period where I can take a mental break, where I don't have to consider anything more complicated than what the weather is likely to do.  Short of changing careers, this is pretty good way of achieving this.

I'm also looking forward to the digital detox.  So much of my life revolves around using and enabling technology that I often feel beholden to it.  3 months with nothing digital should get things back in proper perspective (albeit I'll be carrying a cell phone, satellite phone, Kindle, GPS watch, and solar panel to keep it all juiced!).

I said earlier in the post that age is not a reason for doing it.  Not entirely true.
The largest reason for doing it now, is that I know (or at least think) that I can.
In my late 20's I started suffering from a sore back while playing football.  This went on for a few years until I found it so annoying that I insisted on some scans when I was 30.  An x-ray showed I had Spina Bifida in the bottom of my spine, and the pain was the onset of osteoarthritis in my back.  I remember the doomsday prediction of my doctor at the time, he expected me to be in a wheelchair by my mid 40's.  For the record I don't think this will ever put me in a wheelchair, nevertheless it has impacted my life.  There are certain things I find more difficult, or at the least unwise, to do.

Doing the trail requires 3 months of sleeping in a tent or on dodgy hut mattresses.  Frankly this is going to play merry hell with my back.  I will be taking Panadol and voltaren throughout my walk to keep things in check. 

So the deciding factor to do the walk now is I may not be able to do so in my 60's, or even my 50's.  It would be an exceedingly difficult pill to swallow to have this big goal, but then get to a point where I could not achieve it.

So in early 2017, once I had Karen's blessing (she's amazing!!!), I set the goal of doing it in the next 1-2 years.  Queue lots of hard work planning, and a lot more hard work doing overtime and contract work that I will use to essentially pay myself to keep everything running at home as per normal while I'm away.

Carpe diem!