It’s shearing time!
Shave Him! Captain Cookie decided it was time to get ship shape, so we headed for what seemed the best barber’s shop for the job: ‘The Stylish Man’.
Casually heading down the main street in Auckland the follow day and a girl stops us in the street:
“Cookie! Is that you? The guy with the blog?” …” I recognized you from the free beer post! You can’t forget that face…”
Crikey, you’re in a country for a few weeks and Cookie’s already being waved down by fans :) A bearded icon! It’s like going out with a celebrity ;) Awesome! Haha
Well I must be a few grams lighter now! Also hopefully a few degrees cooler in this humid heat, always feels a bit weird after a big trim though.. Surprised that Katie still recognized me without all the face fuzz, thanks for the offer of dinner next time we’re in town!
Nicky’s Bad Hair Day
I’m bloody cream crackered I am!! And no mistake. “Go on without me! Just leave me here to die…” - well, not quite that bad ;) But there was no way I had it in me to get through the forthcoming boulder climb of a path, even if it was only 2 miles as the crows fly. A bumbling rambling mess, Cookie sniffed out a splendid stealth camp spot, and rolled me up in the tent for the night. Not before administering the universal perker-upper-er that is, a stiff shot of boozes in mug of Berocca.
Thank god I am hiking with super kitted Doctor Livingstone here! We stopped short of bringing the candelabra, but you never know what you’ll need ;)
“Have you seen where we’re going tomorrow Nicky?!”
We could see a feint trail high up on a steep scree slope leading to Waiau Pass. Nicky wasn’t overly excited by the prospect of heading that way tomorrow, I managed to convince her that it always looks much harder from a distance - “when you’re actually there, it won’t be as bad on close inspection”. Turns out I was wrong, this really was a bloody steep exposed route!
The Three Faces of “No”
1. Pretty reticent
2. No longer able to conceal my concern
3. Gibbering to avoid facing the truth!
I was really noT sure about this, as you can tell! We were a fair few days into the tramp, and fatigue was setting in. Knowing I wasn’t totally on the ball, or feeling 110% my gut instinct was telling me this was a really bad idea!
WooHoo We’re Rescued!
A Dallas-esque montage here expressing our delight and joy as the jet boat finally returned with room to pick us up and ferry is back to the glorious land of civilisation, where they say, the roads are paved with hops…
Thankfully the fire making kept us nicely occupied and I was quite surprised when the jet boat came roaring back up the river. It had been an hour, but time flys when your making fire. It was a great relief clipping ourselves into the life jackets knowing we didn’t have to walk out and beer o’clock was merely 30 minutes away!