Day 108 - country road
Harper campsite —-> Methven
24km walk + 47km hitch
My ideas of setting off at first light were dashed when I snoozed my 5am alarm multiple times, my sleeping bag proving too tempting at that hour.
Instead I was packed up by 7.30am and headed off from the shelter into the little settlement of Harper Village.
The trail followed Harper Road for 24km - a country road with a 100km/h speed limit. Although it had very little traffic other than farm vehicles, the TA signage did little discourage them from slowing down; I got covered in dust every time someone went past.
There were lakes
And mountains
But mainly there was just road.
I reached the end of Harper Road at 12.30pm. Instead of walking the final 4km over farmland into Lake Coleridge, I continued on down another road with the aim of getting a hitch towards Methven.
The next couple of sections on TA are notoriously tricksy to organise. Two large rivers block the trail’s path - the Rakaia and the Rangitata. Both are too hazardous to cross on foot (although when it’s low, lots of people attempt to) so we needed to arrange transport around them.
Lake Coleridge sits on the edge of the Rakaia. The plan was to hitch out to Methven to meet Josh and then in a couple of days time, get a bus to the start of the trailhead on the other side.
After walking for 10 minutes, an old farm 4WD comes trundling up the road and the driver (an ex-station manager) wonderfully drives past his house to drop me at the highway where I got another hitch with two young farmers. Armed with a comprehensive description of all the local drinking establishments in Methven they dropped me off outside The Blue Pub where Josh was staying.
Josh had already been in Methven for a couple of days so he proudly took me on a tour of his favourite spots. It felt like a fairly new town with fresh cafes and a great outdoors shop. It had five pubs. Definitely one of my favourite NZ towns we’d visited so far!
We had dinner at Josh’s favourite pub - The Dubliner and then retired to our rather dingy room at The Blue pub. I fell asleep very much looking forward to a day off walking tomorrow.
