Willing and Abel (just found this unpublished lost this entry)

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The aqua-taxi has just dropped us off on a completely deserted beach, the hour-long journey along the coast took us past a pod of gorgeous Dusky Dolphins, includeing a wee bab only half a meter long jumping and flipping over the waves. I even saw my first Blue Penguin tobogganing slowly across the water!

We've only got a 4 hour hike to do today, so we can take it slow, which is lucky, since our packs weigh so much! We just have to time it right, since there's a rather large tidal crossing to circumnavigate and although we have a 4 hour window, I dont fancy missing it and having to wade through, holding my 10 tonne pack above my head.

9:00pm

The tramp around the coast was less challenging than we'd imagined, although the tidal crossing was quite an eye opener - a huge 50 meters of flowing water lay infront of us when we arrived at the shore, the only trouble being that we had no idea how deep it was in the middle, but with Aworoa campsite visible and waiting for us on the other side, we didn't have much choice. I rolled up my boardies into little attractive, (not), hotpants and waded in. About half way across and it was starting to soak through my boxers, my feet were aching from crunching through the broken shells on the river bed and Adam was battelling baby crabs that had taken a liking to his toes. Some German-looking guy had attempted to follow us, but had got stuck in waist-high fast-flow and had to turn back, leading me to wonder how many cocky campers had been swallowed up in the past.

Still, I wouldn't be writing this if we hadn't made it, and to tell you the truth I'm sitting in front of a roaring fire, (sadly gas), supping on a rather tasty ale in a very odd restaurant that we found near the camp site but wasn't on any maps - perfect.

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