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Te Araroa: The Storm That Ends All
Te Araroa: The Storm That Ends All 22.03.2020 Day 146 (16km) Thank goodness it was a short day, because the wind was howling as we walked a pebbly beach towards coastal farmland. One of my gaiters came loose, allowing the tiny rocks to fling themselves into my shoe. With the temperamental weather, I wasn’t keen to stop and remove them. After our final climb of the TA, which was only a couple hundred meters up to a viewpoint, we descended into Riverton’s residential neighborhoods. Alex had booked us an AirBnb, which was so lovely that within a few minutes we decided to reserve it for another day. The weather was…
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Te Araroa: Running From the Rain
10.11.2019 Day 21 (22km) We took out time this morning getting a lift back to the trail, stopping along the way for coffee. It was an easy yet difficult day. Difficult due to the amount of road walking, which kills my joints; easy in regards to the flat terrain. Dom and Nadia were staying with a friend in Waipu, whereas I was hiking on to Waipu Cove. It was the first night that I would arrive somewhere and not know anyone, which I found quite refreshing. A group I had heard about but never met happened to be staying at the campsite as well: Kate, Will, James, and Alex. We…
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Te Araroa: Ninety Mile Beach
21.10.2019 Day 1 (12km) The mild weather and gentle breeze made it the perfect day for hiking. After a quick photo at the iconic Cape Reinga marker we followed the dirt path through knee-high bushes and down the cliffs overlooking the place where the Pacific and the Tasman Sea intermingle. My smile was as wide as my face, and if my face had been larger, the smile would have grown to accommodate it. Everything I had heard about the beach was bad. People dreaded it as much as the plague, or so it seemed. From where I was standing, however, I couldn’t conceive why. The earlier tides had…
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Adelaide
Mosquitos are just little assholes, with no sort of decency. It had been a couple days since my last yoga session, and after the long drive across the Nullarbor both my mind and body were in need of a little TLC. I had already sprayed my exposed skin with repellent. Did the mozzies care? No! Of course not! They began biting me through my clothes and even tried to assault my face. I had to abandon my practice after only ten minutes and retreat to the van till morning. Kimba was a van friendly town, with multiple camping options including showers. Since we were quite close to Adelaide, and miraculously…
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My Favorite Beach in Oz
If ever there was a time when I felt like I was in Oz, it was driving through the south of WA (Western Australia). Bright yellow flowers blanketed the hills, leading us towards the Emerald City…or in our case Esperance. With time running faster by the day, we skipped the vineyards south of Perth and cut east. Esperance was a quiet town with pretty sea views and a prim shore park with all the markings of a progressive city. We spent the day at the park overlooking the bay, under the picnic table shelters. People flowed in and out, visiting a collection of resident food trucks. Looci worked on some…
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The Faces of Kalbarri
We slept at the base of a lighthouse, the waves crashing onto the beach and sending spray over the dusk-lit dunes. Officially, there were only six over night spots, but we arrived too late to grab one and had to risk being told off by a park ranger. The day had been long, full of wonders and unexpected surprises. Kalbarri National Park was right on the coast and had a variety of scenic views. As we drove, I was perplexed by how flat the terrain was and wondered how there were any hikes at all. We were keen to visit Nature’s Window, a lookout high above one of the gorges.…
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Holiday Daydreams
After a night of cockroach infested toilets, we rose early and made a beeline for the quiet beach town of Coral Bay. The bay looked like a turquoise color swatch from Bunnings (the Lowes of Australia); only the hues blended seamlessly with the changing depth. It was visually intoxicating. The water was calm, creating an ideal environment for snorkeling and swimming, though a soft breeze threatened to break the tranquility. We took our time making French toast, unfortunately we were out of the fresh loaf we had used in Broome. The tide had inched its way in, and Looci went to lay on the beach while I set out my…
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Broome
Broome was entirely different from what I expected. I had imagined a sandy coastal town full of hippies and palm trees. There were definitely hippies, and plenty of sand, but unless you were at the beach surrounded by turquoise water, it felt like any other red Outback town in the center of the country. There are a few special things that set Broome apart from other Northern Territory (NT) seaside towns. One was the stairway to heaven which only happened for a short period of time every month when the moon hit the water at the exact angle to create the illusion of a stairwell of light. Unfortunately, we were…
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The Whitsundays
I’ve been to countless beautiful places; aside from Patagonia, this one is right up there as one of the most beautiful. The color was pure, crystal turquoise, that make your eyes thirst for one more look. Each day the tides would rise and play with the white sands, swirling them into unique patterns. Then they would depart, leaving behind a masterpiece of color. Whitehaven beach was rated the second most beautiful in the world, and despite the multitude of tour groups and helicopters overhead, it managed to retain an aura of untouched purity. The sand itself was possibly the most expensive in the world; the US having paid billions of…
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Wilson’s Promontory
The weekend had finally arrived; we had been planning it for over a month and I was eager to get on the road and back out in nature. The last time all four of us had been together was during the Lost City Trek in Colombia. Even back then we had known our paths would cross again in Melbourne, and what better way to celebrate than with a camping trip at Wilson’s Prom? Just a little back story: I met Lucy and Brian on the San Blas sailing trip from Panama to Colombia. Then we decided to do La Ciudad Perdida together, which is where we met Holly, who was…
Insights and Stories Through the Eyes of a Wanderer
