Sunday, we crawled out from under the bridge and thumbed a ride into Waikanae. Rowan was really hungry so we got Subway for breakfast. We put our thumbs out and 30min later a bus went past to Otaki, oh man I wished we knee that. Well the next one comes in an hour. Waikanae isn’t on the main trunk road so we will bus if needs be. After an hour of attempting to hitch the rain comes. We decide to stay dry and go to the bus stop. In the time we were waiting for a ride we saw 4 groups of hikers. I don’t think we will be alone in the ranges. We get to Otaki and from there it doesn’t take long for a car to pick us up. These two ladies take us right to Geoff the trail angel in Levin. Geoff isn’t home but we make ourselves at home it is 30°c not a civilised temperature at all! We will stay at least two nights here. Geoff made us fish and vege for dinner it was really good.

Monday, we aimed to get a few jobs done and ended up in town. We went to mitre10 for some plastic tubing for Rowans water bladder. We walked to all the op shops and then off for lunch at Subway. Then on to New World and then walked back to Geoff’s. Rowan said he would make dinner and we ended up with a German walker Rene for dinner. He booked at the campground but ended up staying the night with us. Sounds like he has been walking with the wrong style of hikers. They don’t match what he likes. I thought my blisters were bad but he takes the cake and the icing. Basically his whole foot at the base is blistered and when he compensated for the pain he ended up with blisters on his toes. I know what that is like you walk funny to make it hurt less and end up with blisters in a new spot.

Tuesday, today is the day we are supposed to head into the Tararua ranges, the weather doesn’t look great so we will head north and fill in Whanganui to Bulls a 65km section we haven’t done. We already decided one more night then we will hitch north to either Bulls or Whanganui. Rene’s hiking friends are due to come out of the ranges where we aimed for but couldn’t make it because of my ankle. They got in late, around 6pm so Rowan’s dinner was late about 9pm by the time they shopped and showered. We decided not to drink because walking the next day but the Germans got into beer and rum haha. After a late night the night before I headed to bed about 11pm. I got a rude awakening from Rowan at 3am. He headed to bed with his tail between his legs. Geoff had come out and told them off for being noisy and keeping them up. Which is fair enough! Luckily I am in the good graces as being a Nana and loving my sleep. Because we ate so late Rowan didn’t realise how late at night it was.

Wednesday, the lovely Geoff hasn’t held a grudge against the boys keeping him up. He drops us off to the end of town to make getting a ride easier. We thank him for having us again. It takes us a long time to get a ride, my arm grows tired. A local lady walks past and has a nice chat to us and a ute comes along and picks us up. Peter is a local Tarankian (I made that up) and is happy to take us to Whanganui. He has traveled extensively and hiked a lot of NZ. We chat all the way and he takes us right to the seaside campground. By this time it is 1pm we were hoping to start walking around 10am and we need to do 15km so we are staying here tonight and making a headstart in the morning.