A selfie reveals a face battered by a week of long distance backpacking and the Blissful Hiker considers her mortality and how to keep her hike – and her life – from being a bore.
In this episode:
If ever there was a metaphor to illustrate the importance of the journey over the destination, it is life itself. For everyone who departs from birth is destined for death, so the journey IS life. Savor it! – Michele Jennae
MUSIC: Poema del Pastor Coya by Angel Lasala as played by Alison Young, flute and Vicki Seldon, piano
available on iTunes
A selfie reveals a face battered by a week of long distance backpacking and the Blissful Hiker considers her mortality and how to keep her hike – and her life – from being a bore.
In this episode:
If ever there was a metaphor to illustrate the importance of the journey over the destination, it is life itself. For everyone who departs from birth is destined for death, so the journey IS life. Savor it! – Michele Jennae
MUSIC: Poema del Pastor Coya by Angel Lasala as played by Alison Young, flute and Vicki Seldon, piano
available on iTunes
Who ever said backpacking was glamorous? Maybe after a day or two, you can still pull off the Patagonia ad look, but I tossed and turned all night as my sore muscles seized up after so many miles. And now I wake up to this really odd bird. It’s gotta be a tui, mimicking something extremely annoying.
My first mistake was to take a selfie here in the Puketi Forest. My eyes have check-on bags. Talk about Miss Crinkles when I smile. The only thing I have going for me is my naturally curly hair, wild in this humidity, and lookie here, going gray.
It’s not that I’m especially vain, but only eight days into the Te Araroa and I look like hell. Tell me, is this worth it?
You’re listening to The Pee Rag, Unfiltered Adventures of the Blissful Hiker.
I am the Blissful Hiker, sometime-professional flutist, sometime-voice artist and full-time pedestrian. The Pee Rag is a small accessory with a big job. Mine is a bandana tied to the back of my pack and keeps me moving along without fuss or muss.
I’ve been taking you along on my first long distance thru hike of the Te Araroa or long pathway, a trail opened only in 2011. It’s 3,000 kilometers long from Cape Reinga in Northland to Bluff, in Southland. I started by walking the beach next to the Tasman Sea and then through the bush towards the Pacific Ocean.
The going has been pretty interesting, like no other trail I’ve ever walked. You just start on 100 kilometers of beach, which sounds all fun and games until you realize there’s no protection from the elements – burning sun, wind, squalls blowing in every hour and inconvenient tides, not to mention hard as concrete sand.
Then, it’s straight into famous Northland Forests of deep New Zealand bush. Because of Kauri dieback, a fungus carried on the shoes of trampers like myself, only one was open still, the Raeatea Forest, but it was an experience I will never forget of mud up to mid-calf, treacherous blowdowns and roots seemingly designed to trip me. I even got briefly lost, and had to camp inside the forest in a wide space in the trail. One thing that was amazing, the birdsong, though right now, I need to press the pause button.
I want to thank Leki trekking poles for supporting The Pee Rag podcast. If you want to be a blissful hiker, Lekis should be in your hands.
And thank you, too, for listening. If you enjoy the storytelling – please subscribe – and go ahead and rate it and better yet, write a review at Apple Podcasts. This helps others find the podcast.
This podcast is dedicated to all the bad ass women out there who don’t need permission to tie a pee rag to their backpack as they walk through this journey of life. And yet, I started this episode revealing my insecurity with my looks.
I guess I have a few rules of protecting my body while backpacking that seem to work, starting with covering up the body wearing long pants and long sleeves. Is it warmer that way than in shorts and a tee? I like to think of Bedouins or Arabs. I realize it’s part of their religion to be modest, but loose fitting clothing protects the body, mainly from sun, but also invasive gorse – a prickly shrub introduced by the Scottish, which has practically taken over the North Island. My outfit also protects me from sandflies, but that’s a story for a future episode. Right now, it’s too early in the spring for sandflies.
I wear a goofy fisherman’s hat called a Chilba made by Kavu. It’s like a Hawaiian shirt for the head, brightly colored with an outlandish design. People either compliment it, calling me The Mad Hatter or something like that – or they avert their eyes. I have not yet seen another hiker wearing anything quite like it.
I also wear gloves for my hands, which are sporting a constellation of brown spots already in my early 50’s. And I discovered a lip balm with SPF protection and color! Blistex Lip Vibrance. The main selling point besides the fact that it gives me an air of middle aged lady heading to the shops, is that I can carry it my pocket all day and it won’t melt or come off in a clump when I put it on my lips.
Other than that, I blend right in.
At Puketi Forest Camp, I set my tent near Irene and Bram from Belgium just in time to jump in it as the rain poured down briefly. I got out to explore and take an ice cold shower and when I returned, a small group had set up with ukuleles. I don’t mind a good old fashioned sing along, but they didn’t offer up any of their own music. Instead they turned their phone up to 11 and set the mood for the camp.
Oh, I’m really getting old. I just don’t have the patience for leaky music into my personal space. So I unstake the alicoop and march over to where Ondi has found a more isolated spot. She’s pretty prickly, and seems to prefer her solitude, so I ask if I can set nearby. We have the same tarptents made here in the US; lightweight and really easy to set up.
I hang around, listen to the birds, then explore the boot cleaning station, a metal open sort of booth above grates for draining the spray at little kiosks holding bristly brushes to get every last bit of dirt out of the boots – or sneakers, in my case. It seems the forests are open to tourists, but not to TA thru-hikers. I mean, it’s not as if they can close them down, but we were advised to use an alternative route likely because it would have been difficult to clean our boots before entering from the north.
I feel disappointed I missed the other forests – Herekino and Puketi, walking instead “through” them, on forest tracks. But Irene needs to catch a plane home to Hamilton tomorrow, so I’m not about to head back just to say I did. Besides, more epic mud and bush await me, except not as many Kauri as I move south.
The morning is humid, but the sun out as the ranger comes by to collect fees. He assures me the next section isn't ‘flash’ but I will get good views.
Flash is such a great word and I begin to hear it a lot from Kiwis – also rickken, as in “I reckon we’ll need to get moving if we’re going to share a beer in Kerikeri.”
Ondi and I both pack fast and quietly, eyeing each other’s little routines. I tell her what the ranger said and that friends thought I’d find thru-hiking boring. I guess that all comes down to your attitude. I mean, life can be a bore if you get caught in a rut and don’t see what’s around you. At least with thru hiking, there’s the promise that, no matter what, each day will bring something new. Not necessarily wonderful, life-changing or “flash,” but for sure, different.
I think about this wonderful quote by creativity coach, Michele Jennae -
“If ever there was a metaphor to illustrate the importance of the journey over the destination, it is life itself. For everyone who departs from birth is destined for death, so the journey IS life. Savor it!”
Boy, am I reminded of death being just that much closer with my saggy eye bags and graying hair. But on goes Olive Oyl, the backpack and off I go, starting on a road! Irene and Bram soon join me, walking in step as Ondi bolts ahead.
Everyone seems so confident and easy going and here I am thinking about my mortality and nothing but mud, blowing sand and roads on repeat ahead when we come upon a fence with one gutted wild pig after another lined up in a row, eyes closed like they’re only sleeping, their huge tusky snouts appearing to smile at us in a hideous grimace.
What the hell? Irene tells us that boars were brought over by Europeans missing home. It’s open season all season. It’s grim, like something out of Lord of the Flies.
I get a little lost in my thoughts as we move along, only one car passing us in an hour, stopping to pick up the French ukulele-non-player from last night hitching a ride. Her backpack is so huge, she looks like a giant bag with legs from behind, and it’s no wonder her feet are trashed and she needs a ride.
But I shouldn’t judge since I have this vexing fear that I’m not going to be able to manage this all on my own. The anxiety manifests in my upper chest, like I can’t quite take a full breath. I wouldn’t say I’m overwhelmed by the feeling, but it never quite leaves me, and on easy walking, there’s no way to stop thinking about it.
I tell myself to calm down and only plan a few days ahead, which is truthfully about all anyone can do anyway but it doesn’t help knowing Irene will leave tomorrow.
Suddenly I hear my name being called. I turn around, realizing I was far ahead and I missed the turn, through knee-deep water and up a muddy embankment onto the fields. I thank everyone, telling them I’d assumed we just followed the road all the way to town.
“Assumptions,” Irene tells me. “Is the mother of a fuck ups.” I laugh and squish through in my until recently dry sneakers up onto a place that looks like an exotic Yorkshire, grass like velvet under my feet, especially when I step in the sheep poo.
“I was just starting to miss the mud.” I say, to which Bram replies. “Careful what you wish for!”
You’re listening to The Pee Rag, Unfiltered Adventures of the Blissful Hiker.
I’m Alison Young, the Blissful Hiker, sometime-professional flutist, sometime-voice artist and full-time pedestrian.
A thank you to Leki trekking poles for their support of show. Let me tell you, whether on road, sand, mud or scree, Lekis held me up and kept me going. If you want to be a Blissful Hiker, Lekis should be in your hands.
If you enjoy the story telling of walking the Te Araroa, New Zealand’s long pathway, subscribe and leave a comment at Apple Podcasts. It helps other find me.
We’re very close to the town of town of Kerikeri – or kittykitty, as pronounced by locals in that wonderfully nasal Kiwi accent that sounds as though spoken while smiling. And that’s true even when someone was angry with me, but that’s a story for much later.
Kerikeri is the place where I landed. It’s full circle in a way, coming back to the start. It’s the largest town in Northland, and the Cradle of the Nation, where the first permanent Mission was established. We’ll follow the Kerikeri river as it makes its way slowly towards the Bay of Islands, and the Pacific Ocean.
Passion fruit, avocados and grapevines were introduced here and started a trend. The oldest pear tree in the country planted in 1819 is still bearing fruit to this day.
But we have a ways to go yet, across fields, over stiles and through gates much like on England’s Coast to Coast.
Wild turkeys huddle at the next opening. One wisely leaps over as five shove under, barely squishing through before running away, feet flying to the side in ungainly gobbling.
It’s easy walking. And, just as promised, it’s not flash but glorious views out to the Bay of Island, green stretching out towards endless blue horizon.
At another stile, a sign welcomes us. “TA Fruit!” it says, with a black sharpie tied to a string so we can add our thoughts, most of them filled with gratitude at the bucket of oranges left for us. Trail angels rock, especially Kiwi brand trail angels.
Ahead is Ondi stopped in the field. When we get closer, we see she’s holding a tiny gray and white duckling separated from its family. I learn at that moment that Ondi is a bird biologist and she packs the little peeping creature into her fanny pack to take to a local rescue which she’s already phoned. An efficient person, that Ondi.
We work our way down the hill toward the Kerikeri River and a grove of Totara, a lot like cedar and I use one as a backrest and sit on the soft needles to eat tomato soup and the last of the cheese.
I hope I find a charity shop in Kerikeri to buy a throw away blouse. I swear by merino wool because it’s soft, stays cool in the heat and warm in the cold and, most important, does not hold body odor. But the one I picked is too thick for this heat and I need to make a change.
We head on and I cross my very first swing bridge. Made of metal and lined with something that looks like cyclone fencing, it’s very narrow, only big enough for one to pass. Bram shows up with loquats he found nearby and we pucker at their sourness.
The river is lined with wild flowers.. I stop briefly to rinse my hands and finger some coolness through my hair. I find a rhythm of pulling out my hat from my hip belt, lowering my balaclava – which acts as a headband – back to my neck when in the sun, then reversing in the trees. I do this without breaking stride.
It’s a gorgeous bush walk, but now on a wide and, thankfully, dry trail. We’re joined by joggers, high schoolers, and middle aged ladies like me walking briskly. Finally, the beautiful river finds its way to a massive set of falls. Welcome to New Zealand! Come in, the water’s wonderful.
Down the stairs to a little rock shelf, we strip to our panties and bras and jump into its cold embrace.
And only a few more minutes walk, dripping wet and happy, to the Stone Store near Kemp House, the oldest building in New Zealand. Happy Hour is on and the promise of a night staying with Irene’s friends far out on one of the arms of land into the Pacific, a hot tub, laundry, far too much food and wine – and another night in a bed.
I feel very, very, well loved.
If you enjoy the storytelling, consider subscribing to The Pee Rag wherever you get your podcasts – and if you listen on Apple – consider giving me a review as that will help others find The Pee Rag.
Like this one from Susan, “Your podcasts in your reassuring voice set me at ease as you give snippets of your hikes I followed diligently. Reading your daily hiking comments brought angst to me, but now that you calmly summarize high and low points, I look forward to the next episodes of Pee Rag. Thank you so much for your new endeavor.”
Of course, I now know how this thing ends! And I’m looking at things with the perspective of time and experience, since right after the Te Araroa, I walked the Pacific Crest Trail. Kind of badass!
Thanks to Leki trekking poles for their support of The Pee Rag.
Next week, I’ll take you past the Waitangi ceremonial grounds to the beautiful Bay of Islands town of Pahia. That’s where the trail becomes a waterway, and I kayak up the Waikare Inlet. Until next week, happy trails!