Friday 10.02.2023

• Te Araroa kilometres done: 1853.7km
• Official kms: 27km
• Garmin kms: 28.46km
• Total time: 8:27
• Calories burned: 3393
• Body battery: 8/10
• Accommodation: Middy hut
• Tent nights tally: 14
• Zero days had so far: 15

https://givealittle.co.nz/fundraiser/walking-te-araroa-3000km-for-the-key-to-life

Track me live here:

https://aus-share.explore.garmin.com/curtiss

It’s always awesome to wake up in a real bed, this time at Woods & Laura’s. We left in convoy of 2 cars this morning as they were dropping me at Pelorus at 8am, leaving a car there & carrying on to Nelson for the day. Big thanks to these awesome friends not only for the bed & pick up but just the support!

The day started as an easy 14km of road walking, just before the end of that Alina & Ladina drove up behind me & chatted as they were being dropped off at the start of the trail. They had spent yesterday in Nelson organising their resupplies all the way to Arthur’s pass.

I caught them up again as I stopped for lunch at the Emerald pools, they had just had a swim & were taking off to Captains creek to get some kilometres done before they would stop for lunch.

After eating lunch I packed up & took off, as I started this section to Captains creek hut the sign said 3.5 hours! It was only 5km & I hoped I would be a lot quicker than that!

Well it only took me just over 2 hours so I was happy with that. The 2 girls were just packing up & taking off after having their lunch & fighting sandflies.

I decided to take this opportunity as an early afternoon tea break & said goodbye to them as I went down & sat in the hut away from the sandflies.

15 minutes later I took off, this time to my final destination for the day, Middy hut. This was also only 5km away, the sign said 2.5 hours. It was now 3pm & I was hoping to arrive around 4:30pm. It took just a little longer than that but I arrived at 4:40pm.

The 2 girls were in the hut having a break, their destination tonight is the next hut. They are considering joining me & my brother for the Nelson lakes section, I hope they do! After saying goodbye I took off down to the river for a swim, I was thinking I could be all alone at this hut tonight.

As I came back up to the hut Sam turned up! I hadn’t seen him since the Escarpment near Wellington. We just spent the rest of the afternoon doing typical hiking stuff such as dinner, filtering water, drying clothes etc.

It’s been another big day & I’m looking forward to my Zero day on Sunday. Just tomorrow to go! Also really keeping an eye on this weather to figure out what I’m doing next week.