tramping new zealand

I’d been ambivalent about TA, Te Araroa, who needs to walk 70 km through Auckland, bash away through gorse or down long km of farm trails up in the North Island?

Last March I’d run into two solo TA NOBOs, Janine and Adam, on my way south to the Lewis Pass and discussed their thoughts out on the track, they were very happy out there.

Over time the thought gradually permeated that it was worth spending the time to link the whole South Island together, in any case, what better way is there to spend a New Zealand summer?

As it turned out TA SI was a remarkable experience, meeting around 120 of the approximate 300 people who had similarly occupied their time this way, getting to cross types of landscape I not experienced before, love that tussock. Overall the route was more remorseless than I had anticipated, plenty of 500 m climbs up to passes between the valleys, more than one 1700 m climbing day, and it turns out that 1400 km is actually a long way.

I did start to come off the official track before crossing the Rakaia River, diverting up the Wilberforce to avoid Lake Coleridge road walking, then having a parallel existence to avoid Lake Sumner all the way to Lake Rotoiti. Later I found myself at the top of Mount Richmond once again.

By the time I reached Cooks Cove at the north end of the Queen Charlotte Track, 82 days after leaving Bluff, I felt like I got TA out of the system.

This is the story . . .