I spent the past three nights on the Queen Charlotte Track in the Marlborough Sound. It's a trail that has camping sites and lodges on it, that runs along the coast and ridge of a strip of land in the Marlborough Sound. It's about 71 km long. I took a ferry out to Endeavour Bay, which is about 4 hours from the start of the track (the ferry people said it was too late in the day for them to go to the very start). From there, it was about 57 km to the end. I got there about 2:30 pm and just hiked around the area, but the next day I only had 12 km to the next lodge so I ran the whole way. It was great to be running again; it's been about a month since I last went running. I think all the hiking I've been doing has gotten my legs in shape. I spent that day lazying around the jacuzzi. The next portion was about 24 km long to a place called Portage. It was pretty cloudy that day, but I made it in just over four hours. Shortly after I got to the lodge, it started drizzling, and it continued all day long well into the next day.
Today I only had 20 km to go to the end. This route is great because you can pay the ferry to take you out to the start and transport your pack to your lodge everyday. Yes, this is what a lazy man does. It was fantastic.
I took the interisland ferry from Picton to Wellington this evening. It was only 2 hours and a half hours to cross Cook's Strait. Now, I'm in the North Island. I'll be in Wellington (the capital) for the next few days. There are a few interesting things going on this weekend. First of all, there is a rugby tournament going on called "seven" which means they have seven people on each side instead of 15 (?). It's made finding accommodations kind of tricky. I will be changing hostels everyday for the next couple days. The tourney goes on Friday through Saturday. Saturday happens to be Chinese New Year, I just read. Sunday is Waitangi Day, which is sort of like their July 4th, except not really. The Treaty of Waitangi is an agreement between the Pakeha (the European settlers) and the Maori, but it's been hotly contested ever since its signing back in 1840. Anyways, I think there will be a bunch of festivities going on. Also, the third leg of the Global Challenge kicks off from Wellington on Sunday, so I will try to catch that as well. That's a big round-the-world yacht race. Anyways, those are my plans. Hopefully the weather will improve because it's been kind of drizzly the past couple of days.
