January 22, 2010

The coast with the most (Big Walkers that is)

From the beautiful town of Wanganui a new leg begins. Involved are our intrepid kayakers Matt, Phillip, Craydon and Scott, joined by two lovely ladies Briar and Lydia. All six hail from the Hawkes Bay and are all excited for the leg to start, having had the priviledge of staying at Shelley’s home in town.

We elected to kick off with a nice easy start, in the form of a 7km bike and an 8km walk. The team stonked out the whole distance, pulling off their 7km bike in just over an hour. We broke for lunch at the beach, entertaining ourselves at alovely little park with playground to boot. Post lunch it was on the wae wae express down to our campstie for the night. The team arrived shattered at Santoft forest and we pitched up for the night. The boys decided that a night under the stars was in order and spent the evening grabbing fallen trees and branches in the hiope of creating a water proof shelter for the night. Huge thumbs up to everyone who built their own bivvy, they looked very cosy, and the water proofing was an all but successful endeavour.

With the fading light we played the most epic game of capture the flag in our lives. A very psychological game ensued, with smack talk and tactics galore. The best team won in the end though and some of us even had a three from three total  at the end of the session!

The rain put in an appearance the next morning, which was rather unfortunate, but we hopped on the bikes anyway, headed out of the forest in the direction of Foxton Beach. We battled the elements all day, with the wind and rain joining the party for the majority of the day. A definate highlight was having lunch under the fly and hearing Robin say “Is the tide coming in?” Just as a huge wave rushed into our makeshift shelter… oops. We strolled into Foxton Beach Motor camp just in time for dinner.

Another attempt at the noodle challenge saw us all feeling slightly green around the gills this morning, and once again the record was not broken, (Tongaririo Crossing still holds that title) we all did very well though, we are slowly  making our way through to the end of the noodles.

We headed off to bed ready for our last day and trip into Levin for the end of the leg. Everyone is all smiles and loving that the sun is showing signs of life this morning.

Cynthia

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