Te Araroa Trail – Day 93
Thursday February 8, 2024
Distance/ Total: 26.0 km / 16.2 mi
Despite my murderous rampage on the sandflies that got in my tent last night, the outside of my tent was swarming with sandflies this morning. I ate breakfast, packed up most of my gear, and applied insect repellent before venturing out.
They still swarmed me while I took down my tent and packed it up, but the insect repellent kept them off of me. I started down the trail about 7:10am.
Today the trail looked like an easy walk down the Waiau Uwha River and Henry River. The trail followed the shore of the river mostly in wide open meadows in the lowlands. Occasionally it would go up into the trees to cross a moraine or skirt the edge of a hill the river bordered.
There were numerous stream crossings and it wasn’t long before my shoes were soaked and stayed that way for the rest of the day.
The day started out cloudy and soon began to sprinkle on me as I walked. Not enough to put on a rain jacket, but enough to be annoying. About 11:00 am the sun broke through and the rain ended. It was a beautiful day in the valley. The views up and down the valley were gorgeous under the sunlight.
I reached the Anne Hut about 2:00 pm and spent the afternoon relaxing around the hut. Several other hikers arrived throughout the day and we all enjoyed visiting with each other.
About 5:30 everyone started cooking dinner and I joined in the preparation as well. I visited with a couple of ladies from Auckland who are section hiking the trail. They are doing from St. Arnaud to Arthur’s Pass. Both some pretty tough sections.
About 7:00pm John and Laur (from the USA) showed up and we visited for awhile as well. I started getting ready for bed about 8:30 and had just crawled into the bed when everyone started running out of the hut. I looked around to see what was going on and a whole herd of wild horses had just run behind the hut. They stopped just past the hut and looked at all the people holding up things in the air (cameras). I bet we were quite a curiosity to them. After a few minutes they turned and ran up the valley.
