• Te Araroa kilometres done: 1047km
• Official kms: 30km
• Garmin kms: 30.92km
• Total time: 7:44
• Calories burned: 2719
• Body battery: 8/10
• Accommodation: Airbnb in Taumaranui
• Tent nights tally: 10

It was good to get a relaxing afternoon & an early night last night. I am really looking forward to a zero day tomorrow! It’s also been awesome having my wife Antonia with me as she has made things a lot easier for me when I’m not hiking. I’m lucky to have such an amazing wife.

I’m planning on walking a 30km day today, then finishing off with a few beers with the Tramily for New Year’s in Taumarunui.

We are leaving at 7.30am so I can start around 8am & hopefully be completed by around 3pm.

Once we arrived at the start point we met up with Matt & Naomi, Matt has bad blisters so we offered him a ride back with Antonia to Taumarunui. They both obliged, I hopped out & they hopped in the car for the return trip.

Most of the crew had left the campsite at the start point except Marko, so we walked together for the 1st 15km on mainly gravel road, through farmland, following a rail line until we hit a small dairy at the 15km point.

The rest of the group were there already having a cold drink & an ice cream.

I didn’t stay long as I knew Antonia wasn’t far off meeting me for lunch. I left after 10 minutes & within 20 minutes had met up with Antonia who had delivered left over pizza & cold drinks! Another awesome car boot lunch break.

Some of the group walked past & I jumped back in & joined Nichola & her friend until Kevin caught up. Then we walked together for an hour or so until I needed to take off to reach my end point which was a bit further on than the group, my aim today is to do 30km to the Canoe hire place 3.5km past the main township where Antonia is picking me up.

I thought I would quickly pop into the Rusty nail pub at the end of town as Nici had arrived back in town to rejoin the group after being away for just over a week having a Christmas break.

Heading out of town over the bridge I watched a Canoe & a Kayak going down the Whanganui river. They made it look easy.

I quickly caught up with Jon, Caroline, Gokul & Tamara as they were driving past from being off trail doing the Round the Mountains great walk for the last 3 days. I’ve worked out that they will be 6 days behind me once they start the Whanganui & don’t think they will catch up unless I had a week off.

At 4pm (a bit slower today) Antonia was waiting at the end to pick me up, she is amazing! We went back to the Airbnb & had showers, something to eat & a bit of downtime before heading back into town, purchasing some beverages & joining the rest of the group for a New Year’s drink for a couple of hours. It was great just to hang out with everyone & I am glad that we got to do this.

We left just on 9pm & headed home for bed, when you are on the trail 9pm is considered bush midnight.

Zero day tomorrow (new year’s day) as I’m on schedule after a few bigger days & I can have a rest just to recover & reorganise & spend a day hanging out with Antonia.

Happy new year everyone, may next year be even better & bring you happiness & peace.