• Te Araroa kilometres done: 730km
• Official kms: 34km
• Garmin kms: 33.06km
• Total time: 7.27
• Calories burned: 3148
• Body battery: 9/10. Excellent sleep
• Accommodation: Robyn’s & Rogers house in Te Kowhai
• Tent nights tally: 7

Today is going to be road walking, this is due to the fact that some of the trail is underwater next to the Waikato river & our Trail angels from the night before warned us it could be difficult as well as reports from others that have attempted it.

We set off at 8am & about 4km in we hit the 700km mark! Not bad but we still had 30km of walking to do today.

The road walking was zigzagging on either side of SH1 going over the top several times before reaching Rangiriri where we then crossed over the Waikato river & stayed on the true right the rest of the way to Huntly.

I only stopped for one 20 minute break today & that was just to have lunch around the 19km point of the day. I felt good so decided to just keep walking.

It didn’t seem long before we were in Huntly with the big power station as the main scenery for this part. We walked to the 730km mark & then detoured across the bridge over the Waikato river one last time to wait at KFC for Robyn & Roger to pick us up.

Robyn & I have been friends for over 20 years. She had put a roast on for our arrival. There was also some marinated raw fish as an entree & cake for dessert!

After a few beers & a glass of wine to finish off the night, it is bed time. We are trying to do another 30km+ day tomorrow so will leave here at 8am. It was really great being able to catch up with Robyn, living so far away I don’t get to see her much, but the awesome thing is it’s always like it was yesterday that we have seen each other. A great life long friend.