Raikura Great Walk

Earl the Penguin

Lee Bay (water almost as blue as Fiji)

Maori Beach (notice the stylish rain cover)

welcome to the jungle

Bambi (brought to the island only for the sport of hunting unfortunately)

mussels at North Arm Bay

common mud patches

hunting for mussels

notice the trash bag rain cover.. pretty white trash

North Arm Hut Bay

New Zealand has nine “Great Walks.” These are multiple day treks that have been classified as the most beautiful and all around best hikes in the country. In a place that is literally crisscrossed by tracks and full of outdoor enthusiasts, this title is pretty important. We hope to do as many of the Great Walks as we can while we are in New Zealand, and The Raikura Trek is our first Great Walk. The track is the most southern Great Walk in New Zealand. It is located on Stewart Island, which is a tiny island located off the southern tip of the southern island. It is one of 38 tiny islands off of the coast. We spent the night of February 17^th in a town called Bluff. Bluff is where you take the ferry out to Stewart Island, and to be honest it reminded me a lot of the California town of Crockett (where John Swett is located, not a nice place). The town seems nearly forgotten and most of the buildings are vacant and the relics of old coastal factories that have long been shut down littered the shore. Needless to say we took the earliest ferry out to Stewart Island on February 18^th.

After an hour long and extremely choppy boat ride (felt like a roller coaster ride with your stomach dropping after every wave) we arrived in Oden, the only town on Stewart Island and home to about 400 full time residents. We checked in at the visitor center and set out for the track. (You have to check in because the island is so remote that in the past hikers have disappeared and been forgotten about for quite a long time before anyone realized they needed to be searched for). The Raikura Track is 35 km in length and we did 12 km the first day. Of those 12 km, 5 were spent walking the road to the actual beginning of the track. Once we got on the track it was absolutely gorgeous. Within 15 minutes we walked straight in to a penguin! The little guy was all by himself and just walking up and down the path. He seemed strangely out of place in the thick jungle like forest. He showed no fear whatsoever and walked straight up to us and stopped only a foot away. It was quite an experience watching him walk around and stare at us curiously. We named him Earl and it was quite difficult to convince Olivia not to pick him up and bring him along as a pet. He followed us for a little while before we finally had to say good-bye.

The track followed the coast and occasionally went down onto the beaches, which gave us some amazing views. We covered the final 7km pretty quickly and arrived at Port William Hut in the early afternoon fully satisfied that Raikura deserved its Great Walk classification. On the second day we headed out of Port William and straight into the thick and muddy forest. Much of the forest resembled the jungle we saw in Fiji, although as we went up and down in elevation you could see the forest change significantly. The bird life on Stewart Island is very affluent. We of course saw Earl, but Stewart Island is also home to the Kiwi, which is New Zealand’s national bird and what the people call themselves. While we didn’t see any Kiwi, we did see some birds that ranged from what looked like a green and oversized pigeon to a tiny brown and white bird that had the most beautiful call we can ever remember hearing from a bird. The forest was majestic, but we were happy to come out of it and arrive at the North Arm Hut, which was on a bay. North Arm is home to an enormous oyster population, and we were informed we could eat them. As the tide went out Kyle felt adventurous enough to go out and find a few to eat. (They were not very good, and that says a lot because we had not had much to eat over the past two days). We were treated to an amazing sunset over the bay and made some friends with a couple from Amsterdam and a pair of German foreign exchange students who are studying at Dunedin (still not too many Americans over here even though Europeans have to travel twice as long to get here….).

The last day headed back into the woods but we occasionally skirted along the shoreline and did our best to avoid the thick and sometimes very deep mud. It was more stunning landscape and forestry, but with Kyle’s ankle aching, and Olivia’s knee acting up, we were both happy to break out of the forest and back into Oden. We walked an average of 12K per day which was 4-6 hours depending on how many hills we had to climb. Once in Oden we immediately got a hot lunch of delicious fish and chips and local beer, and met some more than colorful locals (We think the island starts to get to your head after awhile…). We took the ferry back to Bluff where we are staying at a campsite that has hot showers, full kitchen, and a laundry machine (Basically enough amenities for us to over look the otherwise worthless town of Bluff).

Next up we start heading back north along the west coast. We have a long list of Great Walks and next up is the Kepler Great Walk Track. Kepler is located a few hours north in the heart of Fiordland. Fiordland is basically a massive national park that is widely regarded as the most beautiful landscape in New Zealand. We are hoping the lush forests, waterfalls, and fords won’t disappoint and that the somewhat rainy weather we have been experiencing goes away and we finally get some real summer weather.