Day 55 – Half?

The family we stayed with gave us a ride to the trail head so we didn’t have to walk the road sections. There was rain. A lot of rain.

We got to a shelter and there was a couple there who decided to take a zero at the cabin. We kept moving, mostly just to keep warm. Technically we crossed the 1500 km marker so we are half way, but since I skipped some parts and added a couple extra, it’s not actually half way for me, but still amusing.

Eventually I bumped into a kiwi couple that I had met before, they had been hanging out by a river for the past hour and a half because it was too swollen to cross, but the level was going down, so we stopped for lunch, then forded the river. It was quite high and the current was no joke, but everyone was able to get across without any issues.

Around 3:30 we came to the hut, where “the engineers” (a couple from the UK) and two others had taken a zero. Austin and Thomas wanted to keep going, but with the weather not being great and with no good options to camp that we knew of for the next 20km, Malween and I decided to stay. I hung my hammock inside the hut because there was only floor space. 4 other people showed up and camped outside. There was a little more rain overnight, but just a couple passing showers.