I guess it was a tuesday when Megan, Miguel and I walked to the south side of Dunedin to start our hitchhiking journey southward. Hitching seemed to be the best and cheapest way to get down there, so we gave it a shot. First dude to pick us up was this real nice hillbilly from the hills outside of Dunedin. He referred to himself as a hillbilly, so he wouldn't be offended by this term. His name was Ryan, by the way. So Ryan told us how he just lives alone on 50 acres of land with his dogs and hunts and goes fishing whenever he desires. His work allows for 2 days on and 2 days off, so he gets to spend heaps of time doing what he wants. Overall, he really came off as a guy who just loves New Zealand and loves doing what he does. Turns out, he has traveled all over Europe but always finds himself coming back to NZ. I can understand why, its pretty super duper down here. So, Ryan dropped us off about an hour down the road and we got picked up by a van full of college students on a field trip. It was pretty funny to just have 7 polytechnic school students give us a bit of a lift down the road. After they dropped us off, we got picked up by this little Asian man who did not speak English very well, despite living in NZ for the past 15 years. Miguel, sitting in the front seat, tried chatting it up with the man but it proved to be a somewhat difficult task. Meanwhile, Megan was passed out asleep and I was sweltering in the back seat. It was a pretty hot day, and our Asian man didn't realise til more than halfway through that it was quite warm in the car and figured out he forgot to turn on the AC. Oopsies. After a couple hours, we eventually rolled into Invercargill and then managed to convince the Asian fellow to take us the extra 20 minutes to the little town of Bluff, where we could get the ferry to Stewart Island. We arrived in Bluff about 3 minutes after the last ferry to the island departed for the day. Ugh we were so close! Megan, Miguel and I then posted up in a bar that doubled as a hotel for the night and just hung out til the morning. Just a note, there isn't too much going on in the little town of Bluff. Not much at all.
The next morning we woke up early, ate some breakfast and caught the early ferry out to Stewart. Once we got there, the three of us just hung around the little town and waited for our other group of friends, who had made it to the island the night before and spent the morning on another small island. They eventually got back and we all set out on our trip. The first day, our crew comprised of Noah, Michelle, Jake, Jackie, Megan, Miguel and myself. The track that most of us would be doing was the Rakiura Track, whick is one of the 7 Great Walks of New Zealand. I say most of us because after the first day, Noah and Michelle broke away from the pack to do another track that was 9 days instead of the 3 days and 2 nights Rakiura. So we all hiked along the trail through the woods for a few hours and saw all sorts of sweet trees and little cove type deals with not another soul around. Seriously, our first day of the hike we did not see anyone else. At one point we decided to take a little rest and check out a small beach. Miguel wandered around a corner and after a second or 2 jumped back and scurried around the corner in an act of surprise. Turned out, this large thing he thought was a rock ended up being a sea lion that caught him by surprise. This big fella had just been hanging out and blending in when Miguel walked by. Pretty funny to see his reaction when he noticed there was sea lion a short distance away.
A couple hours of hiking after the sea lion encounter, we made it to the North Arms Hut, the place we would be posting up for the night. The hut was a pretty schweet set up. It was right by this little cove and beach with a nice view of the water. Also, the hut was huge with bunk beds that were capable of sleeping like 24 people, and we had the whole place to ourselves for the night. We cooked up some dinner and just hung out for a bit before turning in for the night. We were all pretty pooped from the days walk and went to bed pretty early.
The next morning we all slowly awoke from our slumbers and started making breakfast and getting ready to head out for the day. As we headed out, the 7 of us brought it in for a team on 3 and separated on our respective trails. Noah and Michelle went left to begin their longer journey while Megan, Jake, Miguel, Jackie and I continued along the Rakiura Track. That day's hike proved to be slightly more difficult than the prior day for the soul reason that it was a lot of uphill. It was a really great trail, just a lot of uphill. Also, that day involved a lot more mud than the day before it, but that was cool with us. Trying to maneuver around the boggy trail made things a little more interesting at times. It was kinda like solving a puzzle and picking out the best way to go. I think all of us fell victim to the mud at some point or another, but only one or two peeps had a leg sink in up to the knee. Yummy.
After a couple hours of walking, we came across a sweet extension bridge that led us across a creek. This thing was pretty darn cool. It was this old rickety chain link fence type material and it was pretty fun to wander across. Load capacity: one person at a time. Walking across it you could make it swing and bounce around in a fashion that probably wasn't the safest, but still fun to do. Not too long after this suspension bridge, we came across another one that was slightly smaller, but still really cool. Also at this second bridge were the first people we had seen along the track. We exchanged hellos, took their picture and each party continued on their way. Our way only really involved crossing the bridge because once we got to the other side we found a perfect spot along the creek to post up and eat some lunch. It was right along a bend in the flow of things and part was shaded by trees while the rest was out in the glorious sunshine. We all had a nice lunch break and thoroughly enjoyed our location. Before we departed, Megan did a bit of monkeying around a tree limb that stretched over the water and Miguel and I decided to take a dip in the stream. Miguel calmly did a shallow dive type thing, like you would into a wave or something, into the deeper part of the stream while I, well kinda completely stumbled on the rocks in my bare feet and just flopped/fell into the cold water. Boy was that water chilly. It was so nice to get in though, nice and refreshing.
Once we dried off a bit, we continued on our way to finish out the journey to the hut we would be spending the second night. We walked along this one strip of the track that seemed like a never ending pathway through some super duper cool small trees and such. It wasn't that it took a real long time to walk this portion, it just had the feel of a track that never ended. It was really nice. A little bit later, we made it to the coastline and made our way down to the beach instead of following the trail the remaining duration of the walk. We mozied along the sand for a while and saw some really sweet water running along the golden sand. The sand actually gave off a goldish shine because of a certain type of element in it. I can't for the life of me remember what it was, but it was still cool none the less. A short while later we made it to the Port Williams hut where we found some other peeps. There were about 7 other people that would be sharing the hut with us that night. The Port Williams hut was in an even cooler location than the North Arms hut the night before. This hut was in a bit of a bay, and it was like 50 yards from the water. Sand flies were kind of a pain, but not a huge deal. A couple of us ended up jumping in the water there too, which proved to be a little chillier than earlier in the day because the sun had started going down. We then made some dinner and hung out for a few hours playing cards until it got dark and we decided to head into the woods to try and spot some kiwi birds.
We all suited up, grabbed our headlights and wandered into the darkness of the woods. A little while in, Jake, Jackie and Megan headed back to the hut cause they were getting cold and tired and the track was sorta muddy for the darkness. Miguel and I posted up in one spot for a bit, turned our lights off and listened to the forest, trying to make out sounds of kiwis running about. We sat in our location for about 20 or 30 minutes before moving to another location a little ways back down the path. Again, we turned off our lights and just sat listening and looking into the darkness, trying to see an elusive kiwi. This spot too turned out to be an unsuccessful one, so we headed out of the woods and went to the beach to see if any happened to be running about in the moonlight. Again, no dice. At this point I was getting pretty cold in my flannel and shorts, so I decided to go to bed for the night while Miguel stayed out a bit longer to continue the search. Turns out, Miguel's search was very successful. We woke up the next morning and he told us that he managed to find a few during his journey the night before. He said they had really heavy footsteps and were about the size of a small dog that came halfway up your calf. Pretty big little buggers. I was a bit bummed I missed out on the beasts, but there was no way I was gonna make it as long as he did in his search.
When we woke up the next morning, we were greeted with yet another beautiful day. The sun was shining and it was nice and warm. We all made some breakfast, wrangled up our stuff and headed on out to take on the final leg of the journey. The beginning of the walk took us through the portion of forest that we skipped the day before, and it was really schweet. Lots of big trees, crazy moss and some weird ass mushrooms. Overall, a very cool portion of the forest. After about an hour or so of walking, we got the the biggest suspension bridge of the journey. This one was fairly new and was capable of holding 10 people instead of just one. It was in a really cool location too because it was right along a bay and you could look out to the ocean while on it. On the other side of the bridge there was a nice long stretch of beach that we decided to chill on for a bit. We sat around for a few minutes and then Miguel, Megan and myself all went for a swim in the water. Again, it was very chilly, but we all stayed out there for a few minutes enduring the coldness and wandering about in the water. It was really clear so it was cool to check out the sandy bottom. Swim completed, the five of us explored the remainder of the beach for a bit before redressing and continuing our day's mission.
After the beach stop, our walk stayed on the coastline foe the remainder of the trip. It was cool going up and down along the cliff/coast and getting to look out at the water and other parts of Stewart Island for the whole day. A short time after our swim, we saw 2 penguins kickin it on some rocks in the sun a little ways down from the trail we were on. They knew what was up, taking advantage of the sunshine. About an hour or so after that, we stumbled upon yet another sweet bay and beach set up. This was going to be our lunch spot. I found a couple of branches that provided a pretty nice chair and just sat for a bit while eating my sandwich. Then, Miguel and I headed out to this point at the end of the beach where there were some cool rocks that we could check out the ocean on. All around the rocks there was crazy bull kelp that sucked it to any rocky surface it could find. That stuff gets a serious grip and you really have to give it a good yank in order to detach it.
Lunch and kelp time over, it was time to continue onwards towards town and the end of the Rakiura because Jake and Jackie were trying to catch the 3:00 ferry back to Bluff. During the very final stretch of the coast, we hit a couple of really pretty locations. On of which is one of my favorite spots in NZ because you can see a large part of Stewart Island's beach as well as mountains and then look out into the ocean. Another cool spot looked down a hill through some skinny trees and into a cove with a little island about 70 yards away from the shore. Once we got to the end of the hiking trail, we had a few kms to walk along a road and then along a pretty large bay before we made it to the main little town of Oban where we waited for the ferry. Jake and Jackie had scurried ahead of Megan, Miguel and I at one point so they could catch the earlier boat, so the remaining three of us just hung out in Oban and relaxed until the 6:00 ferry. It was a good time to just sit and think about the whole walk we had just done and try and preserve a little bit of energy because all the walking we did wore us out.
Eventually the time to take the ferry back to the mainland rolled around and we scooted on back to Bluff where we managed to hitch back to Invercargill. Jake and Jackie were already well on their way home to Dunedin but it was a bit late for Miguel, Megan and I to start hitching back, so we decided to spend the night in a backpackers. The place we stayed was called Sparky's, and it was owned by a very eccentric little man named Sparky. Sparky never really had the chance to travel the world so he likes having different people from all over the world come to him. He was great dude and had a very positive outlook on life. He also had an obsession with the movie The World's Fastest Indian, which is about this dude, Burt Munro, who is from Invercargill and has a dream of racing his old motorcycle at the salt flats in Utah to break a land speed record. I saw the movie last summer and its quite good, so you may want to check it out. Anywho, stuff situated at Sparky's, the three of us walked into town to get some dinner. Indian. Good schtuff. We then walked back, Miguel passed out instantaneously and Megan and I played some cards before joining Miguel in the Egyptian room because the walls are painted with pretty elaborate Egyptian themed designs. It was pretty unique and cool.
We woke up bright and early the next morning to finish out the journey back to Dunedin. We walked to the edge of town and got a ride pretty quickly from this nice dude heading up to Gore. He was a cool guy, but the place he dropped us off, not so cool. Remember I mentioned Gore before and how it is the country music capital of NZ? Yeah, well it also sucks for hitchhiking. We tried getting a ride for like 2 and a half hours. It was miserable. At one point, Megan and I walked back into town to see if there was a bus that could take us to Dunedin. Nope. Meanwhile, Miguel remained in our hitching spot and eventually got picked up. Seeing as there was no bus, Megan and I wandered to the outskirts of town once again and stuck the thumbs out. This time, we got picked up very quickly. This old, sweet ass car was driving down the road and pulled over to give us a ride. Schweet deal. It was a husband and wife with their 8 or 9 year old son heading up towards Dunedin for a couple days. Awesome. The car was a 1958 Ford Fairlane and the driver's seat was on the left side of the car like back in the states. And, the speedometer was in mph instead of kmph. All in all it was a bomb.com car, and we were more than happy to get a ride from them. The two of us just hung out with the family for a couple hours before they had to drop us off about 20 minutes outside of Dunedin. We thanked them for the cool ride and waited to get picked up for the final sprint home. It didn't take long for some dude from South America to pick us up and take us into Dunedin. He was a nice enough guy but did not have too much to say. I just learned that he moved to NZ about 3 years ago cause his brother had been living here. Anywho, he was nice and he got us home after a long day of traveling.
All in all, the trip to Stewart Island was pretty incredible. We got to meet some interesting people in our hitchhiking and got to check out a very beautiful and fairly undeveloped part of New Zealand. We only got to see a relatively small portion of Stewart Island, so I can only imagine how pretty the rest of it is. Also, it was the first time I had ever done an over night hike, and I really enjoyed it. Its nice to just wander around nature for a few days with some of your friends. Then again, its always nice to just wander around nature, regardless of the time period. Well thats about it for now I spose. I will be adding pictures of the Stewart Island excursion in a couple of days so be sure to check them out. Hope all is going well back in the states. I am now down to my last few weeks down here before heading home and I'm halfway done my exams: 2 down with 2 to go over the next couple of weeks. So long my friends!
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