Steps, steps, steep steps & more steps

Heading off just as the day begins we have a bit of a hike today. We follow the coast for the most part, a lot of it is marine reserve. Watching boats speed past out to open waters. We turn inland for a part of it and climb a steep road, there is this colourful property on our left as we head up and it is some sort of monastery or shrine. I didn’t take photos just in case it was disrespectful. We pass Mt Mania, I look up and think glad I don’t have to climb that (it’s only 25m taller then where we are going lol). There was a natural wharf along our walk which was pretty cool to see.

Wasn’t expecting so much up and down for the Reotahi coastal track but eventually made it to Urquhart Bay and the start of the Bream Head Track. There is a man about to start a hike through Smugglers Bay who tells us some useful information about Peach Cove. There are two beaches one is sandy one is rocky. The rocky one has a natural spring nearby where the water is clean and fresh. We then walked a little bit up we sat for a spot of lunch while looking out at the beautiful views.

I had been warned that the Mt Lion Summit needs fitness as there is a lot of stairs. Well this chunker and the other chunker slowly made our way up. Somebody conveniently marked every 100 steps. At step 200 I was already sore and tired. At step 600 I thought I have another bloody 600 to go! At step 900 I though we need a holiday. When we got to 1200 we were exhausted! I was also very sweaty. Finally at the top, 395m of pretty much straight up. We took a good rest before carrying on.

Much to my demise there were more steps along the ridgeline. Finally we got to the Peach Cove turn off and had a 800m track of steep down which believe it or not had steps, 814 of them to be exact. At this point I was glad to be having a rest day at the bottom. At the DOC hut, we have the whole place to ourselves. Setting up camp and Rowan convinces me to walk down the the beach. We start on the track that gets you to the rocky beach and I tell him no way, I am not doing it. So we turn around and head to the other beach which track is very easy, but doesn’t feel like it after all those steps. After checking out the beach we head back for a wash. I feel like I have been following an 80s VCR workout for the past 5 hours and need a good scrub. We make the most of the end of day light, have dinner and hop into bed. First sleep in a DOC hut!