The Belgian Travellers

After a good breakfast of crumpets and Nutella with the whole family, Mark drops us in Wanaka. We're very happy of our stay here, that felt like a break, even if we took no zero day. We had great time with Mark's family, with fellow TA hikers, we had a WhatsApp with our families and with some friends, I went to the physio, repaired a second hole in my mattress and last but not least, we had an ice cream after lunch in Wanaka before we started hiking!  The trail goes around the lake and we enjoy beautiful sights on the lake and the mountains that stand behind. It's pretty windy and the trail goes up and down in the hills. But there's only 16 kilometers to hike till Glendhu Bay, where we booked a cabin for the night. It makes an easy day, perfect when we have to carry an heavier load because it's the first of a 5 days stretch. Before starting to hike, we need to book a few stuff, like an accommodation in Queenstown, one in Arrowtown and a hut on the Tongar...

During the day that the ex-cyclone Gita hit the country, on the 21st of February, we were hiding in a backpacker in Akaroa. We spent our 2 days reading near the fire. It was awesome.  Marie-Laure decided to tattoo New Zealand and Te Araroa on her upper left arm. Beautiful! If you want a good address for tattoos in Christchurch, don't hesitate to ask her! In Akaroa, we meet again a couple of German that was staying at the same backpack in Christchurch, so we go for a drink together before our buses leave. In Christchurch, we see our friend Tom, a German hiker with who we tramped the Richmonds. He's a very brave and nice guy. For example, when he was waking up earlier than the other people in the hut, he would always go outside to cook his breakfast and prepare his backpack, so that he would not wake them up. On Friday, before taking our bus to Geraldine, I go to the osteopath. My back is painful again. Hiking with that condition? No way! We decide that I will stay i...

Thursday 8th February is a zero day in Hanmer Springs (meaning a zero kilometers day, in other words, we rested), between laundry, vegetables, fruits and hot pools. We met Arne again, but he has a bad pain to his leg, so bad that he actually decided to stop and rest for a while. One of the American girls, Maria, also have to stop for a health problem. The trail is sometimes a real strain for our bodies...  On Friday, we leave our hostel early morning. After 2 hours of hitchhiking, someone eventually stops. We reach the trailhead, from where we cross a river on a swing bridge before starting to walk in a wide open valley.  At the first hut on the trail, we have a look at the hut book where we find a message for us: our friends, Sergio and Coyote, left it for us because we kind of missed each other in the Richmond range. They were hiking northbound for this stretch while we were going southbound, but we somehow managed to miss each other : we were at the Old Man Hut, tha...