Moving from the Queen Charlotte Track into the Richmond Ranges—two sections of trail which could not be more opposite—felt like the true transition to the South Island.

“I want to see mountains again, Gandalf, mountains…” Bilbo Baggins, The Fellowship of the Ring, JRR Tolkien

The Richmond Ranges certainly delivered on the promise of mountains, and I flew up and down them, completely in my element, heart full, a smile on my face.

But first, I had to wrap up the QCT and do a bit more road walking…

Day 57 (2/4/24): 20.25mi, +4691ft // 33.75km, +1430m

Camp Bay to Mistletoe Bay Campground

“The cicadas are so loud I am beginning to worry about my ear drums. When I speak, my words sound muffled like I’ve been standing right next to the speakers at a raucous concert. I wonder if I might actually be getting hearing damage?” —excerpt from journal

I left Camp Bay early and on my own, eager to climb some hills at quicker pace than I’d moved my first two days on the QCT. The sun shone and the sky was electrifyingly blue, it was going to be a hot day.

As I climbed up and away from the Endeavor Inlet and down to Bay of Many Coves Campsite, I admired the many and brilliant hues of the sea. Continuing on, from my vantage on the ridge, I passed above Ruakākā Bay, Tahuahua Bay, Kumutoto Bay, Kaipakirikiri Bay, and several others to the South, with Kenepuru Sound always to the North, each cove, inlet and sound a unique shade of aquamarine, sapphire, turquoise or teal.

The color of the water begged me to jump in, but all I could do was climb hills and sweat and look down longingly on the glittering pools from a thousand feet above.

Occasionally the track took me into shady tunnels of trees—a reprieve from the beating sun but not from the cicadas—there was no point in trying to listen to an audio book to pass the time, I wouldn’t be able to hear anything over the piercing mating cries of a hundred thousand male insects.

I wondered if the females could even differentiate between their screams? If they even cared? Or if they had horrible headaches like I did, and just wanted the opposite sex to be silent already.

I climbed up and over one more steep piece of ridge line, away from Cowshed Bay, and arrived to Mistletoe Bay Eco Village via a steep—albeit direct—side trail, booked my tent site, and went about building my humble abode.

After I had accomplished my chores, the others still hadn’t arrived, so I went for a swim off the jetty in water which looked truly tropical, but was actually very cold. I was cooking dinner when Tom, Eva, Kez, and Curtis rolled in.

We chatted for a bit and then all agreed to go back out to the jetty around 10PM to see bioluminescence. It wound up being really spectacular. Kez and Eva jumped into the sea in the pitch black and splashed around, creating showers of glittering stars all around their shadowy forms.

No part of me wanted to get in the ocean at night, to be cold and wet in the dark, but I was glad someone did.

Day 58 (2/5/24): 21.82mi, +2099ft // 36km, +640m

Mistletoe Bay to Havelock Holiday Park

We left Mistletoe Bay in waves, I wasn’t the first or last, but I spent the day walking alone again—by choice. All of us were heading for Havelock.

I power-hiked the remaining miles of the QCT, it had remained a well graded, gravel and dirt bike path for its entire duration, which I was supremely grateful for. An easy intro to the South Island.

Once I hit the first bit of road, I checked for cell service and gave Logan a call. It was so good to hear his voice. Waves of homesickness washed over me as we talked but, despite missing him, I felt more sure of my mission now that I was onto the final leg of my journey.

I could do this. I could walk to Bluff.

Once on the road, I passed Eva and Kez and made a bee-line for the pub—lured by the promise of chips and a burger—only to discover it was not yet open.

The owner stuck his head out while I was trying to interpret the sign, the hours of which indicated the pub should be open now; he told me the kitchen wouldn’t be ready for a while.

So I walked over to the gas station, bought a pie and a ginger beer, and waited for the others.

The trail continued along the road, and I put in some music to zone out to.

Moments later, I saw a figure biking towards me—they looked vaguely familiar—I squinted.

“Hey! I saw you in Wellington!” The cyclist called out.

That was when I realized it was the girl from Coffee Outdoors, the one who had accepted my embarrassing return of the $230NZD shorts I couldn’t afford.

I laughed uncertainly saying, “Oh yeah! Hey!”

She zoomed on by. Small world (island?).

Still so close to the sea, my views were mainly of the sparkling and turquoise Pelorus Sound.

Eventually my path deviated from road onto trail, and I wound my way up through a stand of pines. The shade was lovely, but barely tamped down my sweat production; my internal temperature was so awfully high, I felt quite faint.

I stopped at a neat little water source just before reaching Havelock—water pouring in a stream from a hole in a tree—and filled my bottle, adding some electrolytes for good measure.

Once in town, I booked a tent site at the Holiday Park and did my chores.

I pitched my tent in the shade of big tree, in the tiny corner of the campground reserved for thru-hikers. I was the first one there. The area would get so crowded later, though, that I would actually move my tent away from the tangle of others, into a more remote corner, to avoid tripping over everyone's guy-lines.

Tom and the others decided to stay at the backpackers in town, but he and I hung out for a little at the holiday park while I did laundry. He would be skipping the Richmond Ranges because his knees were continuing to bother him.

I felt bad for him, missing the Richmonds was a big deal and I knew he was bummed. But I also knew he could come back and do the Richmonds at a later date without much hassle, since he lived here in New Zealand.

I’d be crushed if I became injured out here—all I wanted to do was keep walking and finish the trail healthy—to come back another year and finish might be too costly for me, and it would result in a massive loss of momentum.

We said our good-byes, I would miss hiking with him, and I finished organizing my resupply and mentally prepared for the next chapter of the trail.

Day 59 (2/6/24): 28mi, +3888ft // 46.6km, +1186m

Havelock to Captain Creek Hut (start of the Richmond Ranges)

On my walk out of Havelock I called my mom to catch up.

As we chatted I was struck by how beautiful the morning was, steamy clouds unfurled low in the valley, rising in gentle puffs from the calm surface of the Pelorus River.

When the track turned from paved road to gravel, I put in an audiobook, eventually catching up to Kez and Eva who must’ve left their accommodations even earlier than I had.

Road walking gave way to farm track.

Daltons Track lead us through flat cow fields and over what felt like a style every 50yards. Each field had a different character; some were closely mown by hungry sheep or cow mouths, but in other paddocks the grass was waist high and full of scratchy thistles.

Eventually we reached the Pelorus Bridge and opted to go for a swim in the emerald water. It was a popular swimming area—families and groups of friends were spread across the warm rocks, lounging. A trio of boys were jumping from increasingly higher vantages, egging each other on.

The sun shone down hotly; there were minimal sandflies and only a few wasps. I swam for a bit and then ate some lunch.

After swimming, and before the heat of the day became fully oppressive, we stopped at the coffee cart by the campground and got iced mochas.

Then it got hot. We sweated and trudged—quickly—down eight and a half miles of paved then gravel road. Kez cracked jokes, Eva and I laughed, and we all seemed to be having a good time despite the active melting process we were undergoing.

I wiped my brow and looked up at the cloudless sky, wondering if I might liquify and soak into the dry, dusty gravel.

Reaching the start of the Pelorus River Track—a narrow and careening path through the cool, fern laden woods—was a blessed relief. It was another 5.5miles to the hut but, initially, the miles passed liquid smooth in the golden hours of the day.

Eva and I stopped to swim in Emerald Pool, thinking Kez was right behind us; when he didn’t show up, we looked at each other with expressions of confusion.

Back on the trail at the junction for the pool, he came huffing out of the woods—

“Fuck!” He exclaimed in his charming UK accent. “I thought I was going to be stuck on that bridge until I died.”

Apparently the drawstring from his tent stuff sack—which he carried on the outside of his pack—had gotten hung up on the chainlink of the swing bridge a mile back.

“People were behind me, trying to get on the bridge, I panicked,” He laughed, rolling his eyes sarcastically.

As soon as we all started hiking again, Curtis caught up, too—sweat pouring down his face, his clothes soaked through, he was panting.

“I didn’t think I’d catch you. I ran all the way here,” He looked shell shocked, eyes hollow with exhaustion.

“Why!?” We all exclaimed. “Why did you run?!”

“I left the Holiday Park late this morning,” He took a gasping breath. “I realized if I was going to make it to Captain Creek I needed to run. I did consider staying back at Pelorus,” He conceded.

We continued the final 3 or so miles to the hut as a group, all of us feeling pretty exhausted at that point.

When we arrived to Captain Creek about two hours later, after navigating some very slow trail conditions, we were horrified by the sandfly situation.

[No other portion of the trail—save for Kiwi Hut along the Taramakau River—would feature this level of Sandfly Hell.]

They were thick, coating our hands and arms, every exposed inch of flesh. I quickly and calmly donned leggings under my skirt, my raincoat over my sun hoodie, socks, then my sandals, and finally my bug net over my hat. I proceeded to squash the ten or so sneaky, grubby, black gnat-looking-bugs that buzzed dumbly around my face within the mesh of my bug net.

I had bigger problems than sandflies, unfortunately. My ripstop nylon backpack was blooming with an alarming number of grease stains and it smelled like straight-up hot cheese.

Thank goodness we aren’t in bear country, I thought, shaking my head.

My bag of shredded cheese was the oily culprit, stuffed upside down along the outside of my MacPac liner bag. It was Pams brand, and the ziplock closure did not extend all the way across the opening of the bag—that, combined with the hot temps, resulted in a mess so horrifyingly odorous and slick, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to rectify it in the backcountry.

[My backpack would continue to smell, first of hot cheese then of spoiled cheese, for the rest of the TA. I would wash it in washing machines on two separate occasions and replace the soiled liner bag—to no avail—some messes are forever.]

Day 60 (2/7/24): 19.74mi, +8600ft // 33km, +2623ft

Captain Creek Hut to Starveall Hut

The evening before, after spending the better part of an hour wiping cheese grease off my liner bag with wads of toilet paper and dunking my pack about a dozen times in the river, and before we’d all gone to sleep in the hut, hiding from the hoard of sandflies, Kez and Eva talked about wanting to take more zeros and walk fewer miles each day. The marathon day in the heat had worn everyone out and the sandflies were getting on their last nerves.

I knew I couldn’t afford to slow down, not really, if I wanted to finish in time for Logan to get to New Zealand. I had been crunching the numbers and despite the pressure I was feeling to stick with the group and trust the timing would work out, I wanted to keep moving at my own pace, even if it meant leaving the group at some point.

I departed from the hut in the pre dawn hours that morning and let everyone know I was still planning to make it to Starveall. They were mixed on whether or not they’d make it that far.

The day dawned a moody grey, and the trail was full of big climbs and descents, snarled roots underfoot, and, naturally, some mud.

I powered up to Rocks Hut, and uphill still beyond the hut. The trail was faint and overgrown at times, full of confusing reroutes around large swaths of blow-downs.

After an age of getting smacked in the face by vegetation and tripping over hidden obstacles, I broke free of bush line.

I saw a familiar figure up ahead on the trail and called out, “Taki!”

The hiker paused and turned around, then waved enthusiastically with both arms.

We took each other’s photos at our first real view point in the Richmond Ranges and then hiked on together to Browning Hut, where we stopped for lunch.

The trail was slow going and steep. Each mile felt hard won, but I wasn’t overly discouraged. Taki and I caught up, I told him the story of how my backpack came to be cheesy via Google Translate and hoped the plot line carried through. He laughed and pinched his nose, so I assumed it did.

Taki was only going to Hacket Hut, so I left Browning before he did and hiked on alone.

I stopped for a quick swim under the bridge after Hacket before the Richmond Alpine Track started—undressing and submerging quickly to avoid getting eaten alive by sandflies—then I began the arduous climb up to Starveall.

I ruminated on a few unpleasant interactions I’d had with several older male hikers, recently, as I gained the 3,000ft in 3 miles. Basically, a few of them had spoken condescendingly towards me when I deemed to hike longer days than they.

They told me I was missing important things, that I wasn’t enjoying the hike or appreciating Te Araroa the way I was “supposed” to. I told myself they were just threatened by a woman doing more than them, but the conversations irked me on a deeper level, and fueled my rapid ascent up the achilles-popping-slope angle to the hut.

When I arrived to the hut, I said hello to a dutch couple who was planning to stay there as well, then I was promptly stung by a wasp on the back of my calf. I dared pinch it against my thigh in a moment of annoyance, without looking first because I thought it was just a fly.

[This was the beginning of a severely wasp infested stretch of trail (the wasps are not native to New Zealand, and there are control efforts in place to reduce population numbers as they threaten the native honey bees). Wasp Hell would last beyond the Richmond Ranges, reaching its zenith anytime the track dipped below tree-line.]

I pulled the stinger from the meat of my calf and cringed, already an angry, knotted welt of flesh was firming up beneath my skin, it was hard like a golfball and would dog me for the next seven days, itching and aching.

About 3-4 hours after I’d arrived at the hut, Kez, Eva, and Curtis showed up. I was happy to see them and impressed that they’d made it. They opted to sleep in the hut, despite the comments on FarOut which spoke of a mouse infestation. Brave souls.

I pitched my tent on a sweet little flat spot in the edge of the woods, instead.

Day 61 (2/8/24): 17.6mi, +8026ft // 29km, +2448m

Starveall Hut to Tarn Hut

Today was the day I would finally strike out on my own from the group; I would hike all the way to Tarn Hut.

I left Starveall first that morning, letting Eva know of my intention to carry on. I would not see them again until weeks later when I took a zero day in Hanmer Springs.

The morning was a bit doom and gloom with the low cloud ceiling, but I packed up and hit the trail regardless. The higher I climbed the windier it got and curtains of clouds hid the tallest mountains from view.

It was breathtaking—the buffeting wind and the view—my eyes wide as dinner plates, trying to take in every inch of my surroundings. My hands touched rock occasionally on the climb when the terrain steepened, and when I crested the first rise, I was amazed by the wide, gently sloped expanse of tussock, edges obscured by fog.

This was my favorite kind of mountain weather—turbulent fog, strong winds, dramatic, ever changing.

The trail took me below tree line briefly and the grey sky electrified the lichen which clung to the beech trees in the forest.

Slaty Hut came into view just bellow a hovering bank of fog. I marched down the hill and decided to take a quick snack break at the picnic table outside. I chatted with a couple NoBo’s while I slathered Nutella on a tortilla and said “hi” to Arjuna—the SoBo from Australia I’d met for the first time at the TA monument in Island Bay—then packed up and carried on.

The wind increased in strength as I climbed away from the hut, towards the ridge. The fog consumed me.

A figure in purple materialized in the middle of the trail, 50 yards ahead, blocking my way. He didn’t move as I approached, he was staring at me.

“Hello,” I said and made it clear I wasn’t stopping so he needed to give way. He didn’t.

He just stood there with this slightly constipated look on his face.

“Are you okay?” I said with concern, stopping a few feet away.

“Uhm,” He said. “Yeah.”

But he was still wore a look of utter confusion and he still wouldn’t move.

Then he spoke, “The weather is bad, I went up the ridge and checked.”

“Okay, well, fog isn’t so bad, actually, and the sun is supposed to come out later, so I’d like to keep going. If you don’t mind…”

I was beginning to feel a little stressed.

He made no move to step aside.

“Well,” He continued a bit petulantly. “I don’t want to go up there and miss all the views.” He sounded annoyed, like I was telling him he had to go. I couldn’t put my finger on it but something wasn’t quite right about him.

“Okay, that’s your choice,” I said, and pushed into the tussock above him to navigate around his bulky backpack.

I power hiked on without looking back, feeling irked.

When I made it to the ridge the wind was like a train, I smiled into it and forged ahead for a time. Eventually stopping behind a rocky outcropping to see if I could get some service to text Logan.

Suddenly that purple jacket popped up onto the ridge behind me, I rolled my eyes and refused to make eye contact as he approached.

“Do you mind if I sit with you?”

This guy was either clueless or creepy.

“Uhm, I mean, I am texting my finacé and then I am going to keep walking so…” I let my words trail off and still didn’t make eye contact.

He was American, that much was clear. He sat down.

“When did you start hiking?” He asked.

“Uhh-haha,” I packed as much annoyance into my exhale as I could. “December 10.”

“Oh, you are very fast. I started a month before that. Where are you going tonight?”

NoOOOPE, I thought to myself and set about zipping my raincoat up and organizing my gear so that I could hike on.

“I don’t know. A long way,” I said absently. I got up.

“Oh, I am going to Rintoul Hut,” He said. “Maybe I will see you there?”

And that pretty much sealed the deal that I would be walking all the way to Tarn Hut.

He asked my name as I started to walk on; I told him, begrudgingly.

“I’m John!” He called after me.

And I’m sure John had the best of intentions, but I just felt nervous.

The cloud ceiling began to lift when I reached the summit of Old Man, revealing views of Little Rintoul and Mt. Rintoul. I did not see John again.

As I navigated the narrow ridge and a few easy scrambly sections on steep rock, I thought to myself, I am so over being nice to people just because it is the “right” or “polite” thing to do. Men do not have the right to be so entitled—yeah, but they do have the audacity, I thought argumentatively. And that’s all that matters. They will keep playing like they have every right because on some level they believe they do.

So where does that leave me?

I felt annoyed, I could have been thinking of literally anything else as I hauled myself up the rocky pinnacles, down slippery scree and then back up; instead, I was worrying over being chased down the trail by a random stranger, who ignored every sign I gave him that I wanted to be left alone.

On top of Little Rintoul, I’d mostly forgotten about John, but I’d moved onto contemplating the patriarchy and misogyny as a whole. I pictured myself dismantling the structure of it, like it was a mountain of scaffolding we all danced around, ignoring. On a subliminal level, though, we knew it was there, dictating the flow of traffic, dictating everything.

By the time I’d skittered down from Little Rintoul and made it to the top of Mt. Rintoul, I’d finally worn my brain out thinking about sexism, and was prepared to just enjoy the view.

I took in the rolling clouds, the turquoise gem of the sea in the distance, the multitude of peaks rising up all around me, and I felt whole and happy to be where I was.

But that rickety scaffolding was still there, shimmering wickedly on the horizon, supporting an antiquated structure that hated me, hated women, hated the trans community, hated people of color and minority groups, hated anyone “other” or who presented in a way that couldn’t be categorized neatly into a binary norm.

Well, I hated it. And I would burn my corneas staring at it, refusing to forget its existence, even out here, so far away from all the -isms. No one was immune.

Awareness was the only path forward.

So I kept my eyes open as I hiked down to Rintoul Hut, I just kept them open and I remembered that no one is immune, not even me, to the effects of our patriarchal society—even as I enjoyed the view and stepped gingerly, to avoid sliding straight down to the hut on my butt.

The track was horribly steep and washed out.

I met a section hiker inside the hut—it was oppressively hot in there but there were no sandflies or wasps, cons and pros—he was just out to do the Richmonds and he was drawing with charcoal in a sketchbook.

I ate pretzels and dried mango in a heat induced stupor, watching him draw.

Eventually I got my life together and stepped back out into the afternoon sun. I had just under 6 miles left to get to Tarn Hut, and one more mountain to climb—Purple Top—I prayed it was gentle.

It was.

The views were spectacular and the grade was easy. From the summit I could see a wall of reddish colored mountains and I wondered if that was where the trail was headed.

The descent to Tarn was more up and down than expected, but over all not terrible. I was wiped out when I arrived, though.

The hut was empty, but I didn’t expect it to stay that way, so I pitched my tent on a flat spot in the trees and then sat down at one of the picnic tables and cooked dinner.

A big, black goat lay in the edge of the trees, his horns long and curved. He spent a moment glaring at me, then stood, made a 180 degree revolution and laid back down facing away from me. I shrugged in his direction and carried on assembling the complex concoction in my pot that would eventually be dinner.

Arjuna showed up not long after I was through cooking. We chatted for a bit about the epic day and then called it a night. He had the hut to himself and I had my cozy tentsite—after I scared off the nosy Weka, that was.

Day 62 (2/9/24) TWO MONTHS ON TRAIL: 21.57mi, +8378ft // 36km, +2555m

Tarn Hut to Porters Creek Hut

“Holy wow, three huge back to back days. I feel surprisingly good. I had a dumb song stuck in my head all day, though—not even one I like—and it was just the same two verses on repeat. My stomach sounds like a percolator and my farts are noxious. It is now 8:30PM and I am the only person at Porters so I’ve decided to stay inside the hut to be safe from the shitty possum.”

—excerpt from my journal

I left Tarn Hut an hour before Arjuna, and I did not see him again that day. I wasn’t expecting much from the trail, I thought I’d already seen all the majesty the Richmond Ranges had to offer.

The first stretch of trail to Mid Wairoa Hut was forested and somewhat mindless, but the ultimate descent was a painfully steep one. My knees were talking to me when I sagged my tired body onto a mattress inside the hut. I needed to lay down for a moment. I threw my arm over my eyes and breathed.

The next section of track between Mid Wairoa and Upper Wairoa Hut was supposed to be agonizingly slow and full of wasps. Some of the comments on FarOut even lead me to believe it might be scary, but I knew from experience not to feed into that sort of talk too readily.

My tolerance for “scary” and “hard” seemed to be a tad higher than the average commenter on FarOut, but only because this was not my first long trail or tough adventure.

The track along the Wairoa River ended up being the perfect amount of challenge to keep me engaged, and wake me up for the rest of the day.

I was tempted to stop and swim in one of the many blue pools but the morning air was still a little chilly and the sandflies were persistent, so I trekked on.

I was cautious not to grab a wasp each time I had to reach for a root or a rock to haul myself up or down a tricky section. And as the river grew steeper, I moved a bit slower, carefully picking my way along the exposed, eroded shelf of trail. I navigated around boulders and complex root systems, the occasional blowdown and a multitude of river crossings, until the trail just became the river.

It was spectacularly beautiful, the whole track felt really “out there”, a true wilderness setting.

Before parting ways with the Wairoa, the day now exceedingly warm, I ripped my clothes off and sat in one of its ice cold pools. When I got up to the hut, which was painted traffic cone orange to match New Zealand’s quintessential, orange triangle trail markers, I spent a few short moments inside, eating a quick snack.

I was excited to see what would come next; the hut was nearly at treeline, so I expected the views to be really spectacular and, oh, they were!

I was transported to the high desert, the sandy earth was clay orange, the pumice piles rust red. I stopped for lunch half way up the climb and surveyed the land around me.

What a crazy day, I thought. I started out feeling so tired and unmotivated. Then I climbed all the way up a river, somehow avoiding getting stung by wasps. Now I am in a desert, climbing up to a high mountain pass.

When I made it to the saddle, I was overcome. I recorded a video of myself crying tears of gratitude for my life that I will probably never share.

The views were spectacular, and I could see my trail stretching out before me, a faint slice across the slope ahead. I was eager to continue on—suddenly, I just wanted to run.

My pack hung heavily on my shoulders, but I barely noticed its weight as I marched around the rim of the bowl. I stopped halfway across the traverse, squinting my eyes at an animal which had just walked out onto the scree a distance below me.

A goat? No… It was too delicate, its legs were too long. Maybe a deer? But I could make out a set of pointed horns atop its head. It seemed to bow slightly, to scrape the ground tentatively with one of its hooves, pausing every so often to look around. It hadn’t seen me.

I took a video so I could search for this animal on Google later, and then moved on.

[I discovered it was called a Chamois—a deer/goat hybrid—they are not native to New Zealand but they also aren’t abhorred like the goat. There are very few of them and sightings are somewhat rare.]

The hike down from the saddle continued to be breathtaking. I wished I could stay up there forever, but I had so many miles to go before camp still and I was running low on water.

As I stepped back below bushline, I cast a reluctant glance over my shoulder, what a day this had been.

The hike down to Hunters Hut was surprisingly long, though, and just before peeling away from the Motueka River I decided to go for a swim in the most outrageously blue swimming hole. I wished Logan and Ueli were there with me to swim. They would’ve loved this spot.

At Hunters Hut a man was taking a nap inside. He sat up and grunted when I walked in to sign the intention book.

“Hello,” I said. “How are you?”

He grunted again, “A little better now. You’re not staying?” He asked gruffly.

I hadn’t brought my pack in and his assumption was correct.

“No, I think I’ll go on to Porters.”

“At this hour? Where did you start?” He seemed shocked.

“It’s only 4PM, still plenty of daylight,” I said with a smile, but didn’t mention that I’d started back at Tarn.

I was afraid to get wrapped up in a long conversation and I was melting like a popsicle in that hot, stuffy room, so I slipped out the door and threw my pack back on. The day did feel like a long one, and part of me did want to stay, but honestly? It was just too damn hot to stand still without shade.

When I did make it to Porters, I was relieved. I saw it from a distance, a bright orange beacon in the scrub. I practically broke into song and dance, I nearly cheered out loud.

I was lucky to have the hut to myself that night, but I didn’t sleep particularly well. I was so used to sleeping in my tent. I got up once to look at the stars and air out the hut.

The “noxious gas” I mentioned in my journal was most definitely caused by the Textured Vegetable Protein (TVP) I’d been putting in my ramen; I gave that a rest going forward despite its added nutrition. Clearly it did not agree with me and I was terrified I would knock myself unconscious with my farts, fall into a bog, and never be found.

I strive to be as honest as possible in my trip reports.

Day 63 (2/10/24): 18.2mi, +3228ft // 30km, +984m

Porters Creek Hut to Alpine Lodge, St. Arnaud

The morning dawned soft and pastel. I was tired, and rightly so. The last three days—four if you counted the marathon walk out of Havelock—had been big ones. All I needed to do now was make it to St. Arnaud.

I had a couple more jagged ups and downs left to reach Red Hills Hut, then a massive climb after that, which seemed so extra when I studied the topo map, I didn’t understand why the trail was swinging wide just to take us on some root filled MTB trail that not even the bikers enjoyed riding.

Let’s get this day started, I thought to myself.

After a steep descent to cross a tributary of Maitland Creek, there was a tricky, eroded cliff to climb up. It was hard to figure out the best way to tackle it with a backpack, but after much head scratching and several failed attempts, I clambered to the top.

The slope angle was unrelenting for several hundred feet above the dirt cliff and I leaned forward, pressing my hands to rock and gravel for balance.

The track continued to undulate steeply alongside the creek, often I was very high above it and then, with little warning, I was careening down to meet it; exhaustion wore on me and I was feeling a little grumpy by the time I reached the boggy plateau before the hut.

Shweeeooopp—slap.

And just like that I was down, sprawled on my side, legs disappeared up to my hips in a tussock hole, feet soaking wet in a bog.

I shrieked in the delayed manner of someone who really needs a nap. And my shriek echoed. Embarrassment prickled the back of my neck, but no one was around to hear my outcry.

When I finally made it to Red Hills Hut, I encountered an unusual character—he was tall and full of sharp angles, nose slightly hooked, grey hair hanging lank around his ears in greasy tendrils—I made the mistake of engaging him as I signed the intention book.

He launched into a lecture about how no one should filter their water. An odd hill to die on, I thought.

But it was classic. He’d lived here—here being an unknown location in New Zealand—his whole life and never filtered water, never carried water, for that matter. “All these hikers today with their filters, carrying too much water,” He lamented. “There is water everywhere and it’s all perfectly clean!”

His lecture echoed in my brain as I hiked away. Sheesh.

I opted for the fire road down to the highway, skipping the massive and pointless hill climb on the MTB track. The fire road was gentle and shady and all in all very pleasant.

The road walk into St. Arnaud flew by; I called Logan from a park at the edge of town. It was still early but I hoped I might be able to check into my accommodation and wash the grease out of my backpack—because yes, it still smelled like hot cheese and when there wasn’t a breeze I thought I might be suffocated by its stifling odor.

The last week on Te Araroa had been a big one, I didn’t plan on taking a zero day, but I was contemplating a shorter day out of town tomorrow to account for my fatigue.

Next up… Nelson Lakes National Park! Stay tuned.