Legs and Borders

Another day another river crossing. For this one, being precise was important as the water during high tide could reach over two metres. I left the campground at five with the head torch on, listening to the bird noises hoping they were kiwis. I still need to check on YouTube how they sound like, they are rare, nocturnal and notoriously hard to spot, most of the New Zealanders probably never seen a wild kiwi bird in their life. I got to the crossing by 6am during low tide, it was pretty easy going but I hit a muddy section towards the end and started to sink above my hips level, I had to swiftly retreat and find more suitable section to cross. Ten minutes later I helped Lukas who started later to cross as well. We exchanged the phone numbers and he added me to the TA WhatsApp group which might come in handy in the future. From here on, it was easy going, path was leading through beaches and urban areas with plenty of shops, public toilets...

"Auckland is a shithole" Jonathan After 24 hours spent at the Guangzhou airport I finally managed to board the flight to Auckland which involved changing details on my New Zealand's Nzeta visa as apparently I put in wrong point of entry (I never been asked about that while filling in the form but hey). During the flight I sat next to New Zealander Jonathan living with his Dutch girlfriend Anna in Netherlands and coming back for his brother's wedding on one of the islands surrounding Auckland, when asked what food he would recommend me he said that NZ being a young nation doesn't have that much of a culinary tradition and I should probably stick with having barbeques whenever possible. First challenge after we landed wasn't as I was expecting finalizing the visa, that took only few minutes and a nice chat with the border control officer followed by a simple stamp in the passport. The problem was a baggage check as you are not allowed to bring certain fruits, ve...