Te Araroa Day 4, 90 Mile Beach

Starting km: 70
Finishing km: 101
km walked today: 31

Day 4 of the walk was our third day on 90 Mile Beach.  I really enjoyed having Sarah's company, as this day was as tedious as the previous one on the beach (if a bit easier because we knew it was the final one on the beach.)

We were the second to depart for yet another sunny day's stroll on the beach (don't forget to sunscreen your ears and neck... You're getting it out of the sky, off the water and off the sand)

Incidentally, walking on the beach sounds easy, but is tougher than you'd think.  You have a choice of walking on concrete-hard wet sand or soft dry sand (unless it's high tide, in which case you only get the soft stuff.)

Wet sand is very hard on the feet once you've gone more than about a km (even moreso if you give in to temptation and walk barefoot) and dry sand is just plain difficult to walk in, really taxing your leg muscles.  30+km of this stuff in a day is hard work either way!

Super proud of both Sarah and myself for finishing the monster beach walk. Especially after I promised we'd get a coffee/ice cream at the one tiny settlement we passed on day 4, only to discover they had neither.  Then adding insult to injury we walked an extra 1.6km after the end of the beach so we could wait at a cafe while Brian came to pick us up from the coastal town of Ahipara to return to Kaitaia for the night, but found the cafe closed when we got there!

Brian picked us up from Ahipara and brought us back to Kaitaia for the night.  We both had sore feet (though I was completely blister free!)   

Back in Kaitaia I did a bit of re-supply shopping for the upcoming days' walk and we had a lovely dinner out.  The fish was super-fresh, but the salad bar was maybe even better.  Not having had much in the way of fresh veggies on the trail I kind of overdid it...