After our rest day in Invercargill, Peggy and I head to Dunedin by bus, arriving at lunch time at our cool Hogwartz hostel. After a coffee we go explore the town, following the Street Art Trail. Dunedin has such a variety of buildings just next to each other and the atmosphere can change within a…
Category: New Zealand
Invercargill to Bluff. This is the end.
Day 133. Invercargill – Bluff. 36km. Total 3000km. I couldn’t sleep much last night. Was I too excited? Very tired I get up at 6am. We want to have enough time to celebrate and start early again. The sun is just coming out as we walk through Invercargill back to the trail. The first 10km are…
Done.
This is the end of the toughest, longest but best journey of my life. 3000km. 133 days. 3 pairs of shoes. At least 100l of mud. Uncountable awesome moments, stunning views, amazing people (including my incredible blog readers). I am proud, happy and sad. A big chapter is over. But: Every ending is the start of something new! More…
Colac Bay to Invercargill. Beach again!
Day 131. Colac Bay – Oreti Beach. 27km. Total 2947km. Today we can take it slowly and start late. We won’t hike too far today and enjoy a lazy breakfast. I am completely out of food now, it’s really time for resupply in Riverton, our lunch stop. From our campsite we walk to the beach,…
Woodlaw Forest to Colac Bay. Back into the bush, mud and a night at a summit.
Day 129. End of Woodlaw Forest – Longwood Summit. 36km. Total 2886km. I love tenting in pine woods. Everything is dry in the morning and quickly packed up. We leave around 7.30am and are soon out of the forest to see the beautiful light just after the sunrise. After some farmland it’s a 3.5km road…
Te Anau to Woodlaw Forest. Heat and sunshine, summer has arrived!
Day 126. Te Anau – Princhester Road – Aparima Hut. 22km. Total 2794km. A beautiful day without any clouds is waiting for us this morning. At 7am we are back at the road, with more hitchhiking luck hopefully. But it takes time. After half an hour a woman in a campervan stops and tells us…
Te Anau and stunning Milford Sound. Off-trail.
Day 124. Te Anau. 0km. Total 2772km. Off-trail. Spending a very relaxing day in Te Anau, reading, watching a DVD, washing, walking around to a bird sanctuary and along Lake Anau and of course: eating! Day 125. Te Anau – Milford Sound -Te Anau. 0km on trail. Today we will be driven around, in a…
Queenstown to Te Anau. Back into the mud!
Day 121. Queenstown – Taipo Hut. 24km. Total 2700km. Party Queenstown kept me awake during the night with a lot of music and party going on just in front of the YHA, not easy to sleep if you are used to quiet huts in the wilderness! Today we have a shuttle picking us up at…
Roses Hut to Queenstown. Frozen x 3.
Day 119. Roses Hut – Arrowtown. 23km. Total 2648km. Frozen. Today we start a bit later, we will walk through a river and if we start early it will be even colder. Later means actually that we start at 7.30am, seems we are just ready anyway! One more saddle of more than 1200m to…
Wanaka to Roses Hut. Hike up to 1500, hike down to 700. Repeat.
Day 117. Wanaka – Fern Burn Hut. 26km. Total 2609km. We agreed on a lazy morning as we went to bed late but my room mates wake me up at 6.15am so I go out for a walk in the sunrise. (We only got beds in different rooms). The weather looks promising but still cloudy…
Top Timaru Hut to Wanaka. Mountains and food!
Day 113. Top Timaru Hut – Pakituhi Hut. 24km. Total 2549. Another night of not sleeping as my knees hurt. I promise myself to go and see a doctor in Wanaka…. The wind was blowing the whole night and I was happy to be in the hut well sheltered. All 7 of us in the…
Twizel to Top Timaru Hut. Windy but great days.
Day 111. Twizel – Sawyers Creek Bridge. 35km. Total 2478km. Yesterday evening we had a nice dinner in a pub with Mark and Pall, eating homemade smoked salmon as burger, so yummy! Maybe it was the cider, but I finally slept well, mainly because I managed to sleep on my back so my knees wouldn’t…