Te Araroa, Day 121

We will begin our walk later today, around 9:00 am. It's approximately 13 km to the junction, from where we'll need to walk 33 km tomorrow to reach Camp Taringatura. The only accommodation before that camp is in Lumsden, about 6 km away from the junction.

Fortunately, there's a gravel bike lane along the highway from Mossburn to the junction. It is only 13 km and it takes us only 2.5 hours to reach the junction, but to me it feels longer than yesterday's walk of about 28 km.

At the junction, we hitch a ride to Lumsden for accommodation. We'll hitch back tomorrow to continue on our track. We're picked up by a young Chinese man who's in New Zealand on a Work and Travel visa, trying to improve his English. The short ride with him is pleasant and amusing.

In Lumsden, I grab some food and drinks from the supermarket and call the Lumsden Hotel to inform them of our early arrival. Despite it not being the official check-in time yet, someone from the hotel opens the door for us, allowing us to access our room early.

The hotel is a cozy little place with a good pub that opens in the evening. When I go down to order food (the usual, pizza and fries), I'm asked to wait in the pub. It turns out to be a long wait, much longer than our previous experiences of getting food within 10 to 20 minutes. Tonight, it takes over 1 hour and 15 minutes for our food to arrive. I'm relieved when it finally does and I can get back to the quiet of the room and putting up my feet. 

The weather forecast for tomorrow doesn't look promising, but we'll see how it goes.