Start – Koitiata
Finish – Bulls
Daily Distance – 30 km
TA Distance – 1465 km
Today’s walk was half lovely and half exceedingly boring. The day started out with a quick 8km down the
beach that I was taking photos of yesterday evening. Walking on a beach for the first time in almost a
month seemed rather like a welcome homecoming. I wonder if walking on sand with the sea on my
starboard side will always remind me of early days spent on Twilight and 90 mile beaches? It was
perhaps fortunate that I had a long walk today, or I could have spent hours playing among the driftwood.
Bleached by the sun the tangled fragments of trees looked like the bones from prehistoric sea beasts and
threw up an interesting contrast with the black, slightly magnetic sand. Contemplating the beach I realised
a peculiar thing that I can’t believe escaped my notice until now. In England, the sea has a distinctive salt
smell, so it is possible to know you’re approaching the coast long before reaching it. For whatever reason
NZ seems to lack the brackish aroma that so readily conjures up thoughts of fish & chips and strawberry
iced cream on windswept promenades.
The second half of the day was another tedious roadwalk to town. Bulls is an interesting town though. It
has several things in its favour; a prime location on highway 1, an unusual name, and most crucially of
all, a complete inability to know when a cow joke has been milked dry. Bovine puns and references are
everywhere you look. My particular favourites included extinguish-a-bull (fire station), const-a-bull
(police) and perhaps most tenuous of all relieve-a-bull (public toilets). Special mentions must go to a
large billboard advertising Christmas hams bearing the slogan “Pork from Bulls… there’s nothing like it”
and the aptly named “Rat Hole” tavern where Chris and I ventured for drinks this evening. Given the
town’s plethora of puns I’m frankly shocked that nobody has yet thought to subtitle this little nest of
despair as “excrete-a-bull”. It may be the alcohol talking, but awful bars not withstanding, I’m actually
warming to the place. Just as well I leave in the morning!
