Barefoot for a Future rundown

Abel Tasman

The first day was perhaps over-ambitious! Almost 40km with full packs on day one was extremely tough and pushed us to breaking point. The ground was much tougher than we expected (many paths with small stones and rocks that acted like sandpaper) and being on our feet for 12 hours was tough on the legs.

The beautiful scenery and beaches definitely helped, it was a stunning landscape and the odd beach walk as part of the trail gave our feet some much needed relief.

Day two was shorter but faster, needing 20km before 12.30 to catch our sea-taxi. It started off with a 30-minute 6am extremely cold ocean crossing along broken cockle shells which was brutal from both the temperature and the sharpness, but once completed we slowly warmed up to finishoff day two before rushing from walk to water taxi to rental car to Nelson airport, then Auckland airport and then to Paeroa, all by about 9pm.

Waikaremoana

After replenishing stocks and an early drive, we got to the start of Waikaremoana sore, but excited. Our first day was only 10km, but climbing 600m elevation.

The views of Lake Waikaremoana were absolutely spectacular. We took a lot of photos at the top and still finished in good time.

Day two was tougher – 28km and on sore legs and feet. The mud and leaf litter were much nicer on the feet, but each of us stood on hidden protruding roots about a dozen times which was really sore.

Day three was supposed to be a final 11km and celebrating success. But 3km out we realised there was a mix-up in plans and our pick-up ride wasn’t coming. Vini was walking on a sliced foot, open blisters on each of his feet and swollen ankles at this point.

So I ran ahead to complete the track and hitchhike 50km to our car. I had to walk an extra 7km on gravel road to get picked up on the deserted gravel road in the middle of nowhere, but a friendly local came past and dropped me off.

It was on track to be 100km in 100 hours, but ended up being 113km in 101 hours.