Easy and late start today. But, a very important day for us – today we will reach the official half way point at 1504km.
Christoph and I had a great breakfast. Since we only had to carry food for a few days I changed my diet to fun food. Breakfast includes now real bred, pastrami, cheese and NUTELLA!!! Awesome.

The trail made its way through dense jungle/forest and was partly quiet muddy.


After a short while we arrived at he Burtton memorial and suddenly a group of 25 horse back riders appeared out of the bush – the Taranaki Horse Riding Club was on a weekend excursion.


We kept going since it started raining and it also didn’t stop for two hours.

 

Rain…

Just when we stopped for lunch at an open spot the clouds opened up, sun came out and gave us a nice break for lunch.


Only 6km to go to the official half way point of the Te Araroa! And that’s where it is – in the middle of a pine wood farm which has just been harvested.


Not spectacular but we still celebrated and left a mark.

 

TA – 1504km


On a side note – this is the second one since we were to stupid to calculate how much half of 3008km is the first time. It is not 3004 ???. To much endorphins…

Rest of the day was unspectacular on gravel roads and trails.

Spider nest

When we wanted to pitch our tents just outside of Palmerston we faced the situation that everything left and right of the street was fenced and private property and no room to pitch a tent if you did not want cars driving a meter a way from your resting body at night. Since it was getting dark already we went up to one of the houses which had lights on and asked where there was a possible spot to pitch a tent.


Sarah immediately said “No, worries! Just pitch it next to the house in the garden. And feel free – here is tea, coffee and the bathroom. Do you want to take a shower? Or do you need to wash some cloth?” No comment… ?

So we pitched our tents and enjoyed the view over the city from our spot.


Next morning I left early. I would have not needed to use my alarm clock. The rooster did his job at 5.20 approximately 2m away from my tent starting a concert which went back and forth between him and the Tuis – hilarious!!!

On the way in the morning revealed nice views and I made new friends ?


  
  
After many “flat whites” I took the bus to Mt. Taranaki to climb the volcano tomorrow as a side trip. Used the time to plan the North Island…