Start – Nelson
Finish – St Arnaud
Daily Distance – 0 km
TA Distance – 1979 km
Today was a day for unforeseen meetings, unanticipated reunions and a particularly unexpected squid.
Having stayed up until the early hours publishing blogs and enjoying the rare luxury of television, I was
less than impressed by my 06:00 alarm. Unfortunately there have been many things to sort out today,
which prevented a lie in. Top of the jobs list was figuring out how Ben, Natalie and I were going to get
over to St Arnoud and rejoin the trail. I also needed to ensure that I could obtain a place to stay if we
could get there. After much Googling and phoning around we settled on a taxi to take us the 1.5 hours
rather than go through the trouble of linking up various legs of public transport and hitchhiking/road
walking.
Important logistics out of the way we retired to a local cafe for a late, but pleasingly giant, breakfast.
Speaking of giants, another TA hiker of Ben and Natalie’s acquaintance called Arnie joined us for
breakfast. It quickly became apparent that his trail name of “BFG” (Big Friendly German) is well chosen.
Being of a stature that makes regular sized men look like wee tiny children and sporting a large “hiker
beard” it was a little akin to sitting down to breakfast with a jovial grizzly bear. Fortunately this particular
grizzly had more of a mind for pastries and coffee, so any unfortunate maulings were avoided. Less
fortunately, Arnie is currently on an injury lay-off with foot issues, hence why he is loitering around
Nelson rather than hiking. There seem to have been a lot of people suffering injuries recently. Natalie “the
undrowned” is recovering from an ankle sprain, fake German Laura had serious pain in her foot/ankle that
required several weeks off and I heard today that Mark, (several of whose photos I published a while ago)
is off trail with a back problem. The Te Araroa seems to be an increasingly profitable business for the
medical profession here in NZ.
The taxi ride was uneventful and while Nelson is a lovely town I am glad to be back on the trail. We
arrived in the mid-afternoon, so I had time to collect the resupply box that I had posted in Wellington,
clean out the rubbish from my rucksack and still head out for a pizza dinner with my dorm mates Silvio
(Ger) and Oren (Sco). Having thrown the invitation open to the 8 or so other TA hikers staying at the
lodge we soon had a merry band and a corner of the posh alpine lodge dining area populated with scruffy
folk in need of a shower and shave. St Arnoud is a tiny hamlet, so everyone inevitably eats in the same
place. Nevertheless I didn’t expect to see fake German Laura and Charlotte stroll through the doors as the
hut books had shown them to be several days ahead of me. Apparently they also bailed out of the
Richmond ranges, but via a different route and it took them several days to reach St Arnoud by
hitchhiking. There was plenty of news to share as it has been perhaps a month since we last saw each
other in National Park just before I got onto the Whanganui river. A long time in politics and when hiking
as well it would seem.
Owing to the slightly chaotic last few days I haven’t planned out my camp spots for this next section
through Nelson lakes and the Waiau pass. On this occasion I think I’m just going to see how far my legs
will carry me tomorrow and work it all out from there. Another 06:00 wake-up though to give me the
flexibility to walk long if I feel up to it. Sigh…
