Legs and Borders

"Natural things are by their definition wild, unkempt and more often than not crawling with bugs. Quite obviously, then, natural things are just the kind of things that one does not strive to acquire" Fran Lebowitz Second day of walking along the river today it was Taramakau river. It 'only' had two crossings but they were quite sizeable and of course there was tons of smaller stream crossings thrown into the mix. First thing in the morning I went over Harper's Pass and met a huge bubble of Northbound hikers on the descent. It looked like I was going past the main bulk of people who started in Bluff this summer. After the pass trail was mostly easy going and following the river, except when it would briefly disappear into the forest and.. disappear. Most hikers at this point learned that going on the river bed itself was way easier than manoeuvring around the forest so those parts of the trail were overgrown and hard to navigate. ...

Not much to report today. Good weather, track was running mostly along the river. Halfway through the day there was a hot spring everyone was stopping by. It was really nice but also it made you quite dirty so a bath in the river afterwards was necessary. The hot water relaxed my muscles so much that I found it difficult to carry on for the remainder of the day.There was a lot of people, mostly couples walking both ways today, majority stopped at Hurunui No. 3 Hut just an hour walk before Cameron's Hut where i stayed tonight. Here's pictures of yet another hut called Hope Kiwi Lodge from today: A hanging bridge along the way consisted only of one wire for the feet and two wires to hold on to, Doc really outdone themselves in this one. You could always walk the river underneath if you didn't feel up for the challenge. Philippe Petit would be proud. In Cameron's Hut I met Miriam from Welli...