Day 12 - touristing

Paihia & Russell - 0km

By 9am, I’d chatted with a doctor online, shown him horrendously gross photos of my infected feet and had a prescription sent to Paihia pharmacy - all thanks to the incredibly efficient NZ medial app Well Revolution. By 10am I had the prescription in hand and my feet were feeling better just knowing they were going to be treated! Now we could be tourists for the day.

We found a great little cafe on a side street of Paihia and ordered breakfast burritos - I wasn’t really starting to crave any particular food just yet but anything that didn’t originate in a bag tasted amazing.

We meandered slowly around the Paihia shops and then got the ferry over to Russell. Had we not been kayaking tomorrow, the TA route would have taken us over here so it seemed fitting we pay it a visit. A gorgeous little settlement 15 mins across the bay from Paihia - is it home to one of NZ’s oldest pubs - The Duke of Marlborough - we naturally headed straight there. A few bevvys in the sunshine and I had forgotten all about my feet. I’d forgotten we were even in NZ to walk. We were just on holiday like the rest of folks in the pub, just smelling a little funkier. And wearing crocs.