West Coast Walk, Hokianga Harbour, Waipapa River Track

Hello, hello. We are back online again, after 3 weeks. A lot has happened. So here is a short overview for those who only want to look at the pictures:

- after Dargaville we walked up the West Coast beach for 4 days free tenting

- in the Waipoua Forest we saw HUGE Kauri trees and met Steve hitch hiking who does WWOOFing

- we stayed at his place in the Hokianga Harbour for 10 days, worked on his farm and received free food and accommodation

- we hitch hiked to Kaitaia and did a day of busking to earn some money and met great people again by just knocking at someones door

- afterwards we walked through the Puketi Forest along the Waipapa River for 3 days and ended up at Bills and Renes, who had invited us before and greatly welcomed us

- we will stay here a little longer and try to find some work as fruit pickers =)

So here are the pictures:

The start of the West coast walk saying good bye to Gavin who drove us to the beach.

On the Maunganui bluff when we just arrived as the sun set (walked about 20 km on the first day), and slept on top of it, the first time free tenting. Kind of cold... and windy...

On the second day we tried to get back to the beach and got stuck on cow paddocks and in the bush. Lina even fell into a Kuhscheissgraben =) but then we finally found the right track with the orange signs...

...that lead us over these beautiful hills...

...until we finally and immensely happily arrivedly at the beachly...

...Thomas managed to light the first campfire on our trip on which we roasted tuna and cooked potatoes.

As we had finally reached the beach we celebrated the next day by writing a song about walking along the sunny west coast beach.

On this the third day we gave up walking after two hours as we found a little shack at a river where we stayed for the night. So we had a relaxing day with fishing, reading and washing our clothes with our self built washing machine.

On the 4th and last day of our west coast walk we decided to walk the rest as we assumed it couldnt be too much left... we were wrong. I turned out to be 35 km during which we had to go up and down the cliffs several (a thousand) times. Thanks to God a nice Lady allowed us to tent in her garden, let us take a hot shower and gave us something to eat. That was one of Linas most grateful nights ever.

On the next day we went to Waipoua forest to see the huge Kauri trees and they really are impressive!!

As everyone else we couldnt help but also write our names into the barrier =)

Afterwards Steven picked us up and told us about his little Fat n Juicy Farm where we started WWOOFing the next day...

... that means working 3-4 hrs (usually we did more) a day and getting free food and a nice place to sleep. This is us working:

and here Thomas is participating in a Chili competition (which he really regretted the next day...) but still he git to the third round (130.000 skoville)

One Saturday we drove this truck down to the town center and sold some smoked fish and mussels attracting the people by singing... and even earned some money by doing so =)

This is one of the beautiful sunsets in the Hokianga Harbour after an unsuccessful fishing afternoon. 

"The LEANING tower of Pisa" Thats the best way for Kiwis to remember Lila's... ehhh Lina's name ;) have a close look at the pizza.

In Kaitaia we knocked at Candice's door asking if we could put up our tent in their backyard and had a great evening with them and their kids... lovely!

We even met her sister Nanette and her daughter Shannon and stayed a night at their house. Also wonderful people. Thx for the great sandwiches again ;)

They even let us shoot their rifle.

Unfortunately the calf ran away when Lina tried to actually stroke it.

We started the two day Waipapa River track. This picture, though, is very misleading because it looks rather romantic...

... the track was in a very bad condition, not only muddy as you can see, but in some parts even nonexistent. Only the signs would let you guess where it might have been once upon a time.

So this is how are feet looked like after two hours and they even got worse...

After 5 hrs the track improved a lot but then it lead straight up a 400 m hill (when we were already really exhausted.... but we had to finish the track "in time" before the sun set to get to the campground)

We arrived at the camp ground JUST before dark and were able to set up the tent and have a good rest. We were so relieved after 9 hours of walking (the signs said it would only take 7.5)

This is the Maori way of greeting each other. Here we are practicing during a break on the second day

One of many river crossings... it doesnt look spectacular but it was hard enough to not get everything soaked (First day with short pants by the way)

Happily and tired we arrived at the second camp ground and had a "grand" dinner in a borrowed fry pan (self made tortillas, corned beef, roasted onions and mushroom sauce)

During this very night it started pouring down and storming. Unfortunately our tent and gear got soaked.

But also here God provided us with a nice family that had rented the camp ground hut for the night and left early in the morning. So they let us dry our clothes and gear at the fireplace and that's where we waited for Bill who had promised to pick us up three days before, because he knew the weather would be bad.

So we started washing and drying our DIRRRRRTY and muddy gear.

We were even able to take a hot bath and relax, amazing! This is Bill preparing the pig we had for tea last night. 

Today we helped their sons with their holiday project of building a Medieval Castle. So we made some animals and cannons out of self made Play Dough (Knete)

 So that's it. We are so grateful for every little moment we get to experience over here. Kiwis are awesome, so nice, open, trusting and spontaneous. Thank you everyone and thank you God!!!