Shocking

2 May

Te Kuiti to Waitomo

KM 870.8

Distance: 15.7km

Elevation: ascent 744m; descent 685m

Steps: 32,300 (includes running errands)

Time: 9:10am - 4:10pm

We woke up to our hotel room (Waitomo Lodge, confusingly - but a great place to stay) still an utter mess from our packsplosion. But we had a mission - do our grocery shopping, fit everything into the packs, and then make our way to the township of Waitomo. 

Again, we figured the relatively short day, distance-wise, meant that there would be no problem with us having a slightly later start.

Again, shockingly, the trail laughed at us. It was an unexpectedly hard day!

The trail started off directly across the road from our hotel through a frisbee golf course. Lovely autumnal colours throught his section, although it rapidly became difficult with steep climbs and heavy packs (6 days of food, and yeah, we may have gone a little overboard with the treats).

Once at the top of this hill, we had great views of the surrounding area, including our near future - the solitary hill in the distance towards the right we believe is Pirongia.

The rest of the morning was spent on farmland; a well-marked track but I think we were taken up and down every hill and possibly through every paddock on this farm! This part of the trail definitely added to the ascent/descent stats.

Just after lunchtime (our standard crackers with salami and cheese but this time with a treat of avocado - yum!), we entered the bush portion of today's track. We were shocked on entering the bush to see highly restricted possum gin traps - basically old-school bear traps that clamp down on a paw. They're restricted due to the animal welfare aspect, it's horrific to see an animal trapped and in pain like that.

The bush walk was at times clear and at other times a bit difficult to navigate. Like when supple jack is entangled over a tree fall. This would have been easier to navigate if not for our packs, getting ensnared in everything! In this photo, it's the supple jack, but in the rest of the track it was mostly gorse, manuka and wild rose that clung on to us. Eliza found about a half a gorse bush in the various open pockets and crevices of her bag on arrival to our accommodation tonight.

We exited the bush section after two short but sharp climbs-then-descents to come back out into farmland again. This farm had many electrified fences that we climbed over using stiles placed for that purpose. We lost count of the number of stiles we used today, but our leg muscles could probably tell the number. A couple of times the track crossed a fenceline at a gate, so we used the insulated handles to open the gate or at least move the fencing. Eliza missed the insulated barrier once, and got to feel what an electric fence pulse feels like. She pulled her hand back immediately, shocked both literally and figuratively, but not too badly - she reckons she's had worse shocks from doorknobs or car doors!

The final section of the walk was across cleared karst landscape. This limestone-riddled part of New Zealand holds the Waitomo cave system, which is world-famous for its extensive network of caves, and for its glow-worms. In fact, this is probably the first thing that Eliza knew about New Zealand! She read a book* in her early teens that had an extended chase scene through the Waitomo caves. This must have instilled a subconscious desire to visit one day... 

 

On arrival into the village of Waitomo, we found an open cafe and treated ourselves to a well-earned repast. Knowing our accommodation was less than a half hour away meant we could relax for a bit.

It's just a short walk up the road to the Hamilton Tomo Group Hut, a rather extensive set of buildings with a large common area, bunkrooms of various sizes, and plenty of showers and areas to dry gear. Non-group members are welcome to stay for a small fee, and can book online (obviously the group members get priority, say on weekends).

On the short road walk to this 'hut', we came around a corner and saw a semi-truck and several vehicles behind it stopped on the road, with a man directing traffic. He approached us and asked if there were cows following us up the road. Having neither seen nor heard any cattle, we said 'no', confusedly. The man shrugged and then waved the semi-truck and other vehicles to proceed down the road. About 30 seconds later, we all saw the front of the herd of cows coming around the corner, so the traffic had to all stop again. We were shocked to realise that we had apparently been just ahead of this herd of cattle as they were moved from one paddock to another, and hadn't realised it at all.

Just before sunset, two other TA walkers arrived. We'd met them once before, on the outskirts of Palmerston North - at that time they were headed south to go into the Richmond Ranges. We love how the trail keeps bringing us back to meet people again and again!

A couple of other sights from today - we're truly into silver fern territory, getting occasional glimpses of the startlingly bright underside of the fronds.

We also came across a vacated cicada exoskeleton, perfecly preserved on a fencepost.

Vaughan sat on the deck with a hot chocolate to check out the birds which were around. A couple of fantails, a pheasant calling in the distance and several tui. His 2022 species tally istands at 80.