MONDAY 21st FEBRUARY - BACK IN THE WILD

I’m back online, i'm back on track,
Don't think me lazy, don't think me slack.
I just stopped off to earn a crust, and I assure you it was a must.

So now i’m set and back on course,
There are no regrets and no remorse.
It’s just me and the road until the journeys end,
Continuous motion my new best friend.

Leaving Te Ararore, I decided to walk down the Coromandel peninsula to avoid the city walk out of Auckland. The Coromandel is a rugged and lush peninsula with a volcanic range running up its length and it was over this range that I decided to walk. My good friend Rollo dropped me off at Coroglen in the morning where I could pick up the track down over the Kauaeanga valley into Thanes on the other side. My map showed some big peaks so I was expecting a hard day but as usual I had little idea of what lay ahead. The best way to be as one can only be surprised. Chatting to a morning dog walker I found out it was only about four hours up to the Pinnacles which looked on the map to be almost a day away. The good news bounced me down the gravel road towards the track and it seemed that my tramping intuition was finely honed at last as I took all the correct forks along the way.

The track began in the best possible way, with my first swing bridge! The steel wire crossing was bouncy going with a pack but luckily the suspension held for my passage. The track was steep but well formed and as I was starting fit this time I puffed my walk easily upwards. After an hour or so the bush gave out to the more desolate landscape of the upper plateau. High scrub scattered with tall dead trees created a post apocalyptic effect as I made my through the meandering tracks. It had been cloudy all day and as I ate my lunch I felt a few drop of rain. It would be Sod's law to get drenched on my first day back but thankfully all the Sods must have been on holiday as throughout the afternoon the sky shed its grey face.

The rest of the track up to the Pinnacles was hard going, the steep rutted and root strews path slipping me into muddy pools on several occasions. My swearing must have scared all the other trampers away as I didn't pass anyone until the descent down the valley. Then, however, I was on the main motorway and I passed several school groups, saying hello to every 40 nor so kids as they passed. I must have looked like a robot stuck in a logic loop, Hello, hi, hello, hi....." I’m surprised one of the kids didn't thwack me on the back of the head to snap me out of it!

Towards the bottom of the grand steep sided valley I stripped off and had a freezing dip in a river rock pool before drying starkers under the sun. Luckily no one passed but I reaconed if I shut my eyes tightly they wouldn't be able to see me. I came to after a little dose and headed on down the track. After another elasticated swing crossing I headed on down the Kaureanga road as far as my legs would carry me before pitching up in a DOC campsite. It felt good to be back in the wild again and I think I heard the shrill call of Kiwi (the bird!) neighbors in my half sleep but it was probably just my dreams taking over. I had seen what I though to be a Kiwi nest earlier in the day and I almost, without thinking, stuck my head into the large round entrance before large pointed beak thoughts pulled me back from the brink. Only fluffy kiwi dreams for me tonight though.

TUESDAY 22nd FEBRUARY - ALMOST FAMOUS
An early start and a long 18km road walk to Thames to get the day rolling. It would have only been about 10 km if the road hadn't insisted on snaking the hills contours. Such is life, the quickest route is rarely the most rewarding. The Incas and the Romans would have just gone straingt over any obstacles but neither of them lasted. On hitting town I went straight to the office of the Hauraki Herald to see if the local rag wanted a scoop. It was about time to generate a bit of publicity for the cause and it was also about time my beard was revealed to the masses! They were interested but the gravity of my story only warranted the assigning of the most junior reporter of two days. He was a nice guy though and I’m hoping this impression doesn't change on publication.

A quick action snap of my ankles and I set off alongside the main road South feeling important. Soon cars would be hooting from the road and people would be throwing loose change at my feet. One can only hope. It was my sister Jessie's 21st birthday today (UK time) but my calls had yet to find a voice. Spread out by the road for lunch my messages finally found home and I answered my singing phone to my Mum, Sister and Cousin. Drunken conversation and lots of, "I love you's" sang in my ears for the rest of the day. Its lovely to be able to feel so close to my loved ones despite the oceans separating us. It’s only when I’ve got a five second delay on the phone that I feel far away. My Dad had also rung earlier and I had received a few texts from friends so it really was nearest and dearest day for me. It was starting to feel like my birthday!

I road walked about 20km South from Thames through flat field puzzled country before hitching the thumb out to get East and join up with the Te Ararore track around Meremere. My digit eventually stranded me in Paeroa, about 10km N of where I was aiming for and after an hour by the road I headed for the local chippy for a feed. Why be stranded and hungry I told myself. I was far from despair though but must not have looked it as the Chinese woman in the takeaway gave me a free ice cream. Dinner down and the sun following a trucker I had chatted to earlier beaconed me over and said he could squeeze me in. He was a kindhearted Maori chap called Phil and his chuckling wife Dell was also along for the ride. It wasn't long before they persuaded me to stay at theirs for the night with the promise to drop me at the track in the morning. I just had to accompany them in the diesel refueling truck on there round for a few hours until Phil knocked off. So there I was, driving around roadworks, old PowerStation’s and quarries while Phil filled up all the heavy machinery and Dell filled out the paperwork. So surreal, I just never know where I will end up every morning and who could have anticipated this. After the 100th Caterpillar my head started lolling and I drooled my way back to their house to get fed and donated a sofa.

WEDNESDAY 23rd FEBRUARY - RETURN TO THE SOURCE

Woke up to a crazy house full of kids getting ready for school. There seemed to be a few generations of children but I wasn't awake enough to work out the relations. Maori's use terms such as cousin very loosely. A cuzzie could be and number of different relations so basically it just means related. After a good feed and a chat about Rugby with Phil, who was a real fanatic, we jumped in the car down to Meremere. My plan for a 7am start failed miserably and I ended up starting the Rangitoto stretch around 10am. On getting there I realised we had only been about 100m away on the previous nights refueling mission. Oh well, I certainly wouldn't have wanted to miss the bizarre night I just had for a dawn start.

I had given Phil my address earlier as he said he might be over in Europe of the rugby world cup, 2007. I was a bit embarrassed when I told him earlier that I had never been to Twickers before. Not being into sport really cuts out a huge vein of conversation over here I have realised. I took a photo of Phil and his grandson by the track sign and then headed off after my very appreciative goodbye. Maori are so generous in their acts of Koha and they really take pride in putting up travelers. As they say, "this is our country and you are the guests." They feel it their duty to make visitors welcome and its great to see people so proud of their land that they take immense pleasure in making sure visitors leave with good memories. I made a mental note to try and do the same when back home but sadly it’s so unfriendly and paranoid there that a proposition of a nights stay would have people running. Murderer, pedophile, pervert... Why else would someone invite a complete stranger back to their home? I’m going to be propositioning every backpacker I see form now on; my flat is going to be the local hostel, full of all the strays mad enough to say yes!

This morning I finally joined the mighty Waikato, NZs longest running river that runs from the silent depths of Lake Taupo to meet the Tasman sea just under Auckland. It holds a deep mythical and indeed physical significance for the Maori iwi (greater tribe) of the Waikato area. It was this river that early settlers canoed up to inhabit these inland plains and indeed many of their pa (settlements) adjoined its banks. It is thus very Tapu (sacred) and is seen as the life blood of the region. Mythical river guardians protect its powers and the track sign informed me that the guardians Wawaia, Karutatui and Te La Roa would assist my safe passage.

Halk a km up the track and I was beside the monstrous but seemingly benign waters. After a few moments I realised that the water was flowing the opposite direction to me. Surprised, as I had ignorantly assumed that I would be following the flow, I thought about it for a while and realised it was actually quite fitting with my Hakoi so far. I had assumed that my journey would flow towards its end but the signs so far symbolised a return to some kind of source, a pathway back to a forgotten or unrealised part of myself. By starting at Cape Reinga, the souls departure point, I was traveling back towards a beginning or birth. A pure and untainted essence of my egoless self and thus an undiluted and selfless perception of the world around me. Although I cringe when putting it in these terms, this really was a journey of discovery. Not a journey of self discovery but a journey of selfless discovery.

The 30 km stretch of the Te Araroa track, opened by Sir Edmund Hillary no less, followed the Waikato's banks all the way to Huntly through farmers fields and wide open flood plains. All of nature was out to greet me and as I floated against the current I caught glimpses of huge Coy Carp in the shallows. The Carp here are not very well liked as, like possoums, they were introduced albeit in their case deliberately. They are blamed for the decimation of the once plentiful eel population and I have heard stories of eel holes over a ft across being found along the bank. Judging on the size of the Carp I think it must have swallowed one of there slippery leviathans. Also basking in the rivers calm were some large hawks and at one point I jumped when one burst out of a nearby hedge. Carpeting my path were fields of buttercup and thousands of butterflies flickered among them. The fields shimmered to the infinitesimal beat of a million fragile wings bringing the track alive before me. Beauty rang from everything around me and even the towering concrete ugliness of the power station as I approached Huntly couldn't impose upon Gaia's features.

Along the track from Rangitoto I passed a Marae, a Maori meeting house, and having not had a chance to have a close look around one before I shed my pack and went inside. I asked permission from an old couple working there, as I didn't want to bound into a sacred place uninvited. The Marae represents the history of a particular tribe and the whole building is in effect a huge family or tribe tree, symbolising their Whakapapa (lineage) back to their ancient ancestors. Adorning the front of the traditional Marae are three carved beams supporting two carved tablets which follow the roof to its apex. Standing upon the tallest beam in the middle and rising up from the peak of the roof is a carved figure of the King or Queen of the tribe and the poles and tablets show his or her branches of lineage. The carved figures being relations across history. Inside this particular Marae the walls were adorned with photos or paintings or relations passed stretching right back to what looked like the original chiefs in their traditional dress. It is this sense of history that binds a tribe together and their collective past, both in relation to their people and lands, helps constitute their identity as individuals. How I long for such a clear sense of identity. I don’t even know anything about my Grandparents let along their parents or parents parents and I don’t think i’m along there. Could my occasional sense of feeling lost in the worlds stem from this lack of past. Ones past determines ones future after all.

Upon reaching Huntly I was picked up by Pat, one of the instructors on the bushcraft course I did before starting my walk. In my usual unorganised state I had only rung earlier that day but luckily he was only too happy to take me in for the night. Fed, showered, waters, washed, tumble dried and given a bed I crashed out, knackered but glowing from the warmth of generosity and family life.

Swinging		Phil & Grandson
The Mighty Walkato		Marae

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