Hello again!

Gosh. I think I blinked, and another year went by.

I remember a sci fi short story from back in the day - "Time, Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones" (Samuel Delaney I think). Looking back over this blog, it feels a bit like that. "Time, Considered as a Series of Te Araroa Hikes".

That, or maybe Groundhog Day?

So here I am, once again belatedly finishing off my prep for the next leg of the TA. One year seems to be just long enough to lose my mojo, fitness and memory (what do I pack? how do I access this bloody blog? etc), so I'm scrabbling to get at least some of that back in time for when I head off on Boxing Day. 

This year I'll be continuing from Whanganui, hopefully through to Wellington - about 341km and 18 or so days.  The route goes down the coast, inland via Bulls to Palmerston North, then down past Levin through the Tararua Ranges (!) before popping out at Paraparaumu and finishing down the Kapiti Coast to Wellington.

Ahh, but those Tararua Ranges have me rather nervous. I'll probably be out of mobile range for 8 days, during which I'll be clambering up and down through backcountry tracks over some serious peaks and ridges. It's notorious for being without doubt the hardest part of the TA trail in the North Island. Oh dear.

Up the stairs at Kauri Point. Not quite the same as the Tararuas, but I have to start somewhere

Cute pukeko pic! OK this one was near Western Springs lake as I was schlepping in to school last week with my pack

A sneaky weigh-in at the local vet

If I can finish this leg, I'll have knocked off the North Island. Woo-hoo! For now - back to my planning. On Boxing Day I'll fly down to Whanganui, and will be able to do a quick blog update before starting walking on the 27th. See you on the other side on Christmas! 

I’ll miss you Paul and Rocco, look after each other while I’m away! xx

PS: I vaguely remember that some of you lovely readers were having problems leaving messages for me on this blog. I suspect there may be some phone settings that may get in the way (eg. phone browsers need to have cookies enabled; and for iOS, “Prevent Cross-Site Tracking” needs to be OFF under Safari settings). You might also need to sign in with a Google account. But if you have a Google account, and are trying on a computer, and still have problems - um, that's all I've got. 

PPS: Pro tip - the display on mobiles doesn’t show the links to the full archive of my past blog posts. If you’re on a mobile and want to jump to my early posts, click on the ‘View Web Version’ link at the bottom of the page. Even better - go old-school, use a PC!

PPPS: Anyway, enough with the techy stuff. Thanks for following my adventures, I know you're hanging in there with me! 😁