Two intrepid walkers - day one.

As you know my middle sister has been over from Australia, visiting. One of the reasons is that for quite some time we have been planning to walk the Otago Central Rail Trail. Well we have finally begun our journey. Of course there is nothing to be fearful of on the trail, except maybe our legs not wanting to keep going :)

On Tuesday 1st March we picked Sis up at 8:15am 

and headed up to Middlemarch where the trail ends/begins.

A quick comfort stop and were on our way by 9:15am.

This was the view as we started out.

The Rock and Pillar range on the left and the 

Taieri Range on the right. And lots of farm land.

As we walked Sis told me about the trip 

she had had on the Trans Siberian Railway and this

filled in quite a bit of our time as we walked.

We didn't notice the time passing. 

We did notice quite a few of these heading

 in the direction we had just come from. Or the end for them :)

Everyone called out greetings and were very friendly.

And yes, looking forward from the start,or looking back

 from where we were it seemed an awful long way to the corner.

But it was a coming up. Just above the gate in the right of this 

photo is a bend in the trail.And when we turned the corner  

we came across the first hut and stamping post. Ngapuna. 

The huts were built after the style of shepherds huts to provide shelter for such intrepid walkers and cyclists as ourselves. 

Oh, were we pleased to see it. Inside we went, bags down,

 drinks out, snacks out and some of that winter gear

 taken off and packed in the backpacks. Yes when we started out it was rather cool but after an hour of fairly solid walking we were feeling quite warm, and the temperature had risen slightly.

And just in case you are interested, that long straight walk was seven kilometres and we had covered it in an hour!

How do we know this? All the information is in the huts,

 along with maps and details of the area you are walking in.

Needless to say, the next part of the walk was slightly slower

but we did the walk in good time for a couple of older gals.

 The next section was also a bit more scenic 

with some interesting sights.Can you see 

the rabbit in the picture above? It hopped slowly

 along the fence line and took very little notice of us.

Then it took off into the gorse.

On one side of the trail was dairy and sheep farming.

This is two paddocks, the cows are in a paddock behind.

Then a bit further up the track were these three old 

girls keeping out of the midday sun.They just looked

 at us and kept on chewing, probably thinking

 "mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun".

Four k's more of walking and we were at Moynihan's Hut, 

a very welcome sight. We stopped here for a few minutes 

as well. The huts are very basic, corrugated iron 

and a wooden form inside to sit on. And we took the 

opportunity to sit each time, but made the mistake

 of letting our feet just dangle. Big mistake at this point

 as they didn't take too kindly to hitting the trail again.

Three hours and 14 k's after we set out we reached our destination. 
We were met at the Rock and Pillar Station by my GKB with
 the car and, another flask of hot water. For  a hot cuppa. He was such a lovely patient support person, he drove us back to camp
 and then took us to the shop to get ice creams :)

Originally we had intended to walk to Hyde which was 28 k's in all, but were so pleased to see our great supporter with the car we decided to stop. It was all a learning curve and set us up for a more relaxed walked the next day and more realistic expectations.
But I'll tell you about that another day. Thank you if you have stayed the distance -  I really should have warned you to make a pot of tea before you started reading.

joining Amy at:

Five on Friday

That's it for this week.

I'll see you here next time. 

Keep well.

Diana