Day 21: Mangawhai Village to Paradise on the Ridge (Pakiri)

It stormed during the night! At one point I could feel the thunder reverberating through me. The metal roof also amplified the sound of the rain. It made me quite anxious, thinking of people out in it in their tents and rivers flooding (I had three to cross the following day). Needless to say, I didn’t have a great night’s sleep. Barbara neither. However, there were patches of blue sky in the morning and only a few scattered showers around until midday.

I started walking on roads to get back to the beach. After about 1 km, there was a river to cross and given all the rain, it was flowing fast and dark (couldn’t see the bottom and gage the depth). There was one set of footprints in the sand, which I guessed belonged to Loïc, a French man that I’d seen a few times and who I knew stayed in Mangawhai the previous night, so I followed them and saw that they he had crossed successfully. This was somewhat reassuring although he’s over 6 feet tall, so only somewhat so. I went a bit further up than where he’d crossed and went for it. Although the current was strong, it was only about knee deep the whole way and very manageable.

After another km, there was a headland and I found Loïc there having a break. We continued together over the headland and then down about 10 more kms of beach to Pakiri Holiday Park. The river right in front of the Holiday Park got to mid thigh in places but was fine to cross as well. Although we weren’t staying, I bought an ice cream from the shop at the reception and was told that we will likely need to make reservations for camping moving forwards since they get booked up in December. That prospect isn’t very appealing given that it’s hard to know more than a day in advance where you’ll be and the one certain thing about the trail is that plans change. After lunch, it was a short road section and then a ridiculously steep climb up through some pastures. Although this time, I had the views of the coast to enjoy. There was some mud as per usual, and the wind was very strong in places, taking my hat that I was thankfully able to recuperate from a hedge that caught it.

My destination for the night was a short detour off trail, an Airbnb called Paradise on the Ridge, that has a room and also offers camping. I took the room of course and had tears in my eyes when I saw it. I have the use of a hot tub and a wonderful bed, my own bathroom and a lovely view. A continental self-serve breakfast is included so I can have toast and fruit for breakfast instead if my usual museli or granola. I liked it so much, I decided to splurge and take a rest day here. I didn’t know how much I needed one until I teared up as the owners showed me around. Also, it sounds like Caroline, Cecile and Michael might join me tomorrow night.

Day 22: zero day

I took the rest day as planned. I didn’t do much, made a call to get some info for a possible kayak coming up in a few days, did some laundry and soaked in the hot tub again. Rose brought me some ginger slices that she’d baked, I guess it’s a popular dessert here, which were lovely. Then told me that she was expecting 20 other people tonight! Michael, Cecile and Caroline confirmed that they were coming here and I ended up sharing my room with them. There seem to be two big groups of hikers as well that are staying in tents and will likely be doing the same itinerary as us for the next few days.

Day 23: Paradise on the ridge to Dome Cafe

We had heard it could take at least 10 hours to do the next section of 21 kms, so we decided to get up early, 5am, and get an early start.

The mud in this section is legendary and it didn’t disappoint.

It was deep and unavoidable and slippery. We crawled along at a ridiculously slow pace. There was one view on the way up but not at the summit. We also passed the Auckland weather station radar.

It was a treacherous descent to a stream just before coming out on a busy road, just as a big truck chugged by on it’s climb up the hill. We soon turned off onto a gravel road that had some nice views and then it was back into the forest for another track. It started out nicely and wasn’t too muddy through some nice forest and then along a stream that we forded twice.

The quality of the track did unfortunately deteriorate and it was quite slow going with all the mud and also fatigue. We eventually got to a lookout over the Dome Valley, including the state highway.

From there it was all down hill in a gravel path with stairs. We’re spending the night at the Done Café, it’s closed but they let us hikers use the facility and sleep here. There are quite a few of us again and I decided to pitch my tent since it’s been a while and I don’t think any significant weather is due.