As many of you know, Aliyah and I have made the drastic decision to quite our jobs, pack up, and leave the country for 5 months. Destination: New Zealand! What you may not know is that we are planning a through-hike, a hike that does not loop back to its original destination, across most of the South Island. Although New Zealand has a well developed backpacking and mountaineering culture and thousands of well maintained "tramping trails" as they call them, not to mention an extensive back country huts network, they did not have a continuous trail that traversed the length of their country.
Since 1975, kiwi's have wanted to develop this sort of trail but it wasn't until 1194 that a man named Geoff Chapple really got the ball rolling. You can read the whole history on the trail's website,
but the short story is that the trail opened in December 2011. A handful of people have already walked the distance of the country via the developing trail which links existing paths, new trails, property easements, and a few sections of road or boat rides. Now the trail is more or less complete and we are going to try a large portion of it; the "Lord of the Rings" section through the southern alps. The chunk we are attempting is well over 1000 km (620 mi) and we are adding several side excursions into some of the more scenic diversions including Aspiring National Park and the Able Tasman coast.
We are flying out on the 28th of October, a date which is getting ever so much closer as we rush to get things ready. I quit my job a few weeks early to afford more free time to pack and plan, and so this is what I've been up to the last few days:
So, for updates on planning, our trip progression, and other kiwi news keep checking the blog as more addicted-style posts should be showing up every 3 to 9 days if I can keep at it. If not, Aliyah will also have a tumbler.
Since 1975, kiwi's have wanted to develop this sort of trail but it wasn't until 1194 that a man named Geoff Chapple really got the ball rolling. You can read the whole history on the trail's website,
but the short story is that the trail opened in December 2011. A handful of people have already walked the distance of the country via the developing trail which links existing paths, new trails, property easements, and a few sections of road or boat rides. Now the trail is more or less complete and we are going to try a large portion of it; the "Lord of the Rings" section through the southern alps. The chunk we are attempting is well over 1000 km (620 mi) and we are adding several side excursions into some of the more scenic diversions including Aspiring National Park and the Able Tasman coast.
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| A typical view in Aspiring National Park. |
We are flying out on the 28th of October, a date which is getting ever so much closer as we rush to get things ready. I quit my job a few weeks early to afford more free time to pack and plan, and so this is what I've been up to the last few days:
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| Maps, maps, and more maps. I love this stuff but it makes me crazy after a while. |
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