We have THOROUGHLY enjoyed our days off in Wellington, then Picton. It had been the perfect mix of chores (resupply, laundry, blogging, phone calls, etc), rest, calorie-loading and playing tourists. Food, food and more food Our Wellington hosts, Carole and Tony, were incredible. We shared several meals with them, including homemade fish and chips and…
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As I said in my last post, we have finished the North Island (NI) section of the Te Araroa (TA), all 1686 kilometers (or 1076 miles)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What a difference 65 days has made…a little tanner, bug bitten and muscular… Please excuse the excess of exclamation points. I simply cannot overstate my enthusiasm for finishing…
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Hello from Windy Welly! Wellington is NZ’s capitol and at the very bottom of the North Island, which means we have finished the North Island and have trekked 1686 kilometers, or roughly 1076 miles, during the past 65 days!!! I hope to do a grand summary of the North Island very soon. But for now,…
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Hello from Whanganui! We left Taumarunui last Saturday and have come 322K, or 207 miles, to kilometer 1370 on the trail. It has been a long time without service, so I apologize for the information and picture overload. We’ve had a VERY interesting 9 days on the trail. This is definitely our favorite section so far.…
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Hello from Taumarunui! We have traveled 158K, or 101 miles, from Waitomo to Taumarunui. We have completed one third of the trail! Here are the themes for these past 5 days! 1) Reunion We have been reunited with our Italian friend, Matteo! While we were in Waitomo playing tourists, he did some big-mile days to…
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We are still in Waitomo (btw pronounced Why-Toe-Mo meaning water hole). Yesterday we did our tour of the glowworm caves, but we wanted more. And, we wanted to see them “New Zealand” style (read, dangerous). So we signed up for a blackwater rafting trip! We can remember watching something (Amazing Race?) sometime in 2007 or…
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Hello from Waitomo Caves! We have traveled just 100 kilometers, or 60 miles, from Hamilton. It was about 60K of roads, 45K of forest and the rest was mixed farmland and paved paths. We are now at 890K! We are staying at Juno Backpackers and taking a zero day today (Saturday) so we can play tourist…
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Hello from Te Awamutu, home of Crowded House. Who’s that you ask? Some 80s band, but it excited J. Te Awamutu is not on the trail, but we’ve had the good fortune of connecting with a stateside friend’s cousin’s husband’s father. Got the connection? So they were awesome enough to be used as a mail…
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Hello from Hamilton! We have traveled 200 kilometers, or 120 miles, from Auckland. We are 793K into the trek, more than 25% done! Last Monday, we left the Brown Kiwi Hostel and made our way south. In keeping with the “theme” theme I have going on the blog, here are the main themes from this…
DetailsToday (Sunday), we took a planned zero day in Auckland. Besides our regular town chores (blog, laundry, resupply, phone calls), we also treated ourselves to American football and American pizza! Since today is Sunday in NZ and Saturday in US and the American football schedule has Saturday night football, we lucked out. So we tracked…
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Hello from the Brown Kiwi Hostel in Auckland! It feels like it was just yesterday when we flew here to start the journey. And now, we have walked a total of 593 kilometers, or 356 miles, to get here again! About 20% done! As usual, it has been an eventful 5 days. When we last…
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So, we are on an unplanned zero day. No one is hurt or sick. But remember that wet weather I mentioned? Last night, it got epic. Heavy downpours and gale winds. If you google New Zealand news, the wet weather is a top headline. Didn’t seem like a good day to hike, as the weather…
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Hello from Waipu (pronounced Why-poo, seriously), where we are staying at the Waipu Wanderers Hostel and had dinner (and NZ beer for J) at the Waipu Pizza Barn (so good!)! We have traveled another 200K, or 120 miles, putting us at 420K of the total trek. Or 252 miles. Before I get into all the…
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Hello from KeriKeri, which means “dig dig.” 123K–or 73.8 miles for us Americans–in the books, bringing our grand total so far to 223K, or 133.8 miles. Last I wrote, we were in Kaitaia resupplying. We were worried about getting a hitch from Kaitaia back to the trail in Ahipara. We made a sign and asked the…
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New Zealand has 11,000 kilometers of coastline, and we have now walked along 1% of it. We have walked 60 miles (100 kilometers) from Cape Reinga, the northernmost tip of NZ and start of the Te Araroa, to Ahipara. Almost all of that was on the beach, including 90-mile beach, which is not actually 90…
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Hello from the future! To be precise, we are 18 hours ahead of you east coasters (19 hrs from Midwesterners, and so on). We are currently in Kaitaia (pronounced Ki with a long I – Tie – A), which is in the “Northland” (north of the North Island). We took a 6-hr bus ride from…
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Greetings from San Francisco! We are just hours away from our flight to New Zealand–eeek!! We got to see Seth Meyers live last night as a special treat and he did not disappoint in the laugh factor. He wished us well on our journey and gave us both kisses and hugs. Okay that last part…
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Current mood: a bit frantic, but I believe we got everything done on our to do list. All systems are checked, the bags are finally packed (see pix below – all of that fit in 2 backpacks!) and we are on a flight to San Francisco today and a flight to Auckland, NZ Saturday! Ready…
DetailsOur base weights (without food and water) are: Justin 18 lbs Patrice 13.5 lbs Here’s the breakdown … Backpacks Justin – Gregory Baltoro 65 (2015 version) Weight: 4lbs 12 oz Patrice – Gregory Deva 60 (2015 version) Weight: 4lbs 6oz Tent: Big Agnes Copper Spur UL2 Tent (updated 2014) Weight: 3 lbs 2 oz Sleep System Justin Therm-a-Rest Auriga 35 degree down blanket (750+ fill goose down…
DetailsI’ve said this before. I don’t know how long J & I can ride this wave of working together in different areas of the outdoor industry, but some of our smarter friends said if we really wanted to keep it up, we needed to brand ourselves. So we are doing that. Step by step. Step…
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