The Great Walk at Waikaremoana
Lake Waikaremoana, New Zealand
What do you get when you take two unfit people and make them walk ~ 45 km up and down steep hills with nothing but a heavy backpack? A lot of suffering is what you get.
We start walking from Onepoto at 8.30 in the morning. I am wearing my trusted Ecco hiking sandals that have taken me around Europe, Asia and Australia, with some cheap sports socks. On my back is a 40L backpack that I bought off eBay for $23, containing everything I need for the next 2 and a half days of tramping, as it’s called in New Zealand. On the outside, I’ve strapped on my sleeping bag and a jacket and a scarf for colder weather. For food, I have three apples, three snack packs with three crackers and some cream cheese in each, three muesli bars, some beef jerky and a loaf of bread. I will soon learn that I am a complete fool.
The track to Panekire Bluff is steep and covered in dirt, rocks and tree roots. It doesn’t take long for me to lose sight of Craig behind me, as I ascend the bluff with a strength unfamiliar to me. This is great, I’m thinking to myself. Walking alone in complete silence amongst the tall trees and with an occasional view of Lake Waikaremoana is in a way like my coastal walk back in Sydney. I think about how cool it is that I’m finally doing a walk. Ever since reading Wild by Cheryl Strayed, it’s been something that I wanted to do. Ever since the day Tinder guy and I broke things off on a warm Sunday on the beach, it’s been something that I needed to do.
I think about how cool it is that this backpack only cost me around $20. Then the chest strap breaks. Great. I think about what going home will be like. I think about how beautiful the view is. I think about how I’m starting to feel hungry. I think about how I can’t get Hopelessly Devoted To You out of my head. All I hear, over and over again, is “But now… There’s nowhere to hide”. Oh my God, am I going insane!?
I am motivated by the fact that I am currently leading the race to the top, until I hear footsteps moving towards me, fast and loud. It almost frightens me, not being alone in these woods, as silly as that sounds. I turn around and see a guy running – yes, running – but he stops to ask me if I’ve seen his friend pass. Obviously I haven’t. We chat for a bit and then in a flash, he’s gone. I am impressed that this guy is running 9 km up such a steep hill and I wonder if his friend is attractive – if he can run faster than this guy, he already is to me. When I reach Panekire Bluff, 3½ hours after my first step onto the track, I reunite with Running Man and a couple having coffee. I feel a bit shy joining in on their conversation, so I give them a smile and say hi, but walk around the hut and refill my water bottle and eventually sit down a bit further away from them. Running Man tells me his friend still isn’t here and that he’s worried. The couple console him, and suddenly his friend appears, and holy shit, he is beautiful.
Kinda like this view
Simba, in true guy-I-fancy form, barely acknowledges me, but has a long chat to the couple and finds out that they work with his mom. I have decided to start reading a book on my Kindle and wait for a sweating Craig to catch up while I unintentionally listen to their entire conversation and remember everything, except his name. So Simba it is. Eventually, Simba and Running Man begin their descend to their hut for the night, 20 km away and Craig joins me for an apple and a snack pack.
Walking down seems a lot harder after climbing the bluff, which stands at 1180 metres. My legs feel like jelly and my back and shoulders are in pain from not being strapped on properly. Damn you, chest strap. Once again, it doesn’t take me long to lose sight of Craig, so I just keep on walking, deep in my own thoughts, which have now moved on to Shout Out To My Ex by Little Mix, a song I hate and don’t know the words to. This is going great.
I am growing increasingly frustrated by the lack of signs, as people passing from the opposite direction keep telling me I am an hour away from the next hut, but every hour I am left disappointed. Eventually, after a 16.5 km walk, I see the sign to Waiopaoa Hut and make a turn onto a green lawn, on which a hut with a giant porch is sat. A group of people in their late twenties are on the porch, playing music and drinking out of their mugs or sunbathing. I drop my things off on one of the porch benches and go put my feet in the cold lake, trying to will myself to go for a swim. Too cold.
Everyone at the hut have been here since noon, and it’s only gone 15.30 when I arrive. Adrian, Tom and Holly are on two weeks leave from Christchurch and they have brought goon and plenty of food – even dehydrated cheese cake. Yvette is from The Netherlands and she has brought plenty of hot meals and tea too. Ranger Rangimarie is only twenty and has her own room in the hut full of food and several gas cookers and of course a walkie-talkie in case she needs anything. I am super envious of everyone’s food supply and eat another snack pack, even though I should be saving it for tomorrow. It becomes very clear to me in this moment how unprepared I am for a walk like this. My backpack is half the size of everyone else’s, I have no cooker or utensils, no emergency shelter or rain coat, and worst of all, no boots. My socks and sandals are soaked from a few muddy puddles on the track, so I leave them out to dry on the porch. An hour later, Craig joins me and he’s not happy after a long day of walking. We share a small loaf of bread for dinner while everyone on the porch is talking about food. We talk about what our first meal is going to be when we get back, how we actually haven’t had meat in a while (except for maccas) and our most random but delicious recipes. Rangimarie feels sorry for Craig and I having so little food with us, so she gives us some of hers (even if we don’t have anything to cook the food with). As we sit on the porch, Rangi tells me about the Maori culture and language, which starts off as an innocent conversation about the movie Moana.
Meanwhile, the guys are making a fire and I am gutted I didn’t bring my marshmallows. A boat full of drunk guys pull up just before sunset, the second time today. The legend of the drunks from Gisborne has been told all day, but finally Craig and I get to meet them ourselves. Legend has it that they have been drinking since 5 this morning and that they keep coming up to try and get free accommodation in someone’s sleeping bag. Only two of them are still going, but barely. With a drink in their hand, they are falling asleep as they are leaning on the railing. They mumble something about their friends being passed out on the boat, how they want to stay there for free and how I’m unbelievable in a response to me telling them where I’m from. Naturally, I’m flattered.
After the sound of Rangi’s boss’ boat has scared the guys away, we continue our deep talks about Moana and food and going to the bathroom on the trail. Eventually we all climb into bed, which is basically rows of hard mattresses. It’s one of the worst sleeps I’ve had so far.
After a crappy muesli bar, Craig and I are the first ones off for the walk of the day. We do a one-hour detour to Korokoro Falls, which turns out to be a fairly strenuous walk and a crossing of the river. After a lot of slipping on rocks in the river, we reach the waterfall. It’s beautiful and there’s a hint of a rainbow coming from the water, but the walk of the day weighs heavily on our minds, and we are eager to get it over with. I lose Craig before I even get back on the actual trail.
Eventually I pass Yvette, who had claimed she was a very slow walker. We end up walking the rest of the day together, even though I had originally wanted to do it myself. We are both trained social workers from flat European countries who love walking, so we talk a lot about that. We talk about being frustrated by the lack of signs – and the signs today are lying straight to our faces. 11.5 km later we reach the Marauiti hut and immediately I put my wet, wrinkly feet and my tired, old body in the freezing lake.
Yvette gives me some banana chips and rice crackers that I greedily munch on. Over an hour later Craig arrives, even less happy than the day before. We sit on the porch and chat to a farmer couple from North of Auckland who have travelled most of the world, and once again I’ve met my goals. Craig and I share our last loaf of bread and continue to be hungry until we go to bed.
For some reason we’re off on our walk at 6.30 in the morning. Losing Craig quickly once again, I am lacking the motivation to move today. Not enough food, a sore body and the fact that it’s starting to rain is making me grumpy. Still, I march on and reach the water taxi pickup point by 11.
It’s dead quiet and the view is wonderful, so I strip down and jump in the lake to soothe my body one last time. I then take a quick nap on a rock before the farmer couple and then Craig join me. The water taxi isn’t coming until 2 pm, so I take this time to finish my book. It’s stopped raining, but a heavy fog – or a cloud – is starting to cover the hills, and it’s getting very cold, so I put on all of my clothes and try to warm up. When we get on the water taxi it starts to rain heavily. Eventually we make it back to Big Bush to reunite with Marshmallow and get back on the road and let our loved ones know that we made it back, despite never telling them we were going in the first place.
In the end, it took us 2,5 days to walk over 40 km and we are sore, tired and most of all, super hungry. Being surrounded by tall trees and nothing else has been just what I needed though.
