TA Day 117

TA Day 117: Monday 14 April 2025

The Farm, Russell Road - Paihia, William's Road via ferry (Russell to Paihia)

We left The Farm when the weather seemed relatively stable. Fairly soon, we passed a pasture full of tiny adorable calves that came running toward the fence as we passed. We couldn't just walk by and not say hi to them, so we stopped there for some time. There was also piglets in the pasture, and the mama pig was just walking along the side of the road.

When we finally continued, she followed us for a little while, and one car even stopped, pointed at the pig and asked "Is that yours?" 😂

We also said hello to some horses as we continued along the road. Most of the day we were walking along a gavel road with very little traffic. There, we met a dog named Muffin and his owner.

A little further down the road, we saw a dumpsite. On one side, where the edge of the road disappeared down into the bush, there was sooo much trash dumped. Entire fridges... It's hard not to feel sad and hate humanity when you see things like that.

The gravel road finally entered the tarmac road which we followed almost all the way to Russell. Just before Russell we started following this really nice foot/bike path. On the way we met a man who apparently had been working in Norway back in the day. He had some hens and newly hatched chickens that he really wanted to show us. So cute! He also gave us some fruit we had never seen before - a tamarillo.

We continued along the foot path that didn't exist on any maps, and hoped that the signs towards Russell would actually take us there. But little did we know that the foot path that first seemed so nice, would take us up to a lookout point but what purpose did that serve, when it was as cloudy a d misty as today? We didn't see anything, and all we wanted was to reach the harbour.

So we tried to find a way down which was just a guessing game without updated maps. One of the ways we took led us to a path that wasn't finished yet, and it was muddy and crazy slippery, so Kim slipped once in the mud. Luckily saved herself in time and didn't get her butt muddy.

The shoes were heavy with mud as we tried to hurry towards the ferry. We quickly stopped at the store to buy some snacks and soda for the ferry over, before going there. The ferry was only 15 minutes but we were really hungry and thirsty.

Once we arrived in Paihia we went to Four Square and bought the ingredients for today's dinner that Lukas made for us at the motel we were staying in tonight. Pasta, minced meat, tomato sauce, carrots, onion and spices.

Today's:

Distance: 29.41 km

Ascent: 582 m

Descent: 585 m

Tent nights: 55/117

Weather: Overcast and rain showers