Sunday 8 November 2015

Day 9 - Rest day - finding my mojo - Paihia

I didn't really sleep all that well last night. My legs were throbbing and the people next door were enjoying themselves immensely if you know what I mean. I awoke at 3 needing to go to the toilet - my body clock shot I suspect because of the physical exertion of the past few days.

I was feeling flat and at that stage I didn't want to walk anywhere tomorrow, the day after or even the day after that.

I lay awake until people started stirring and then got up had some breakfast before heading into town to re-supply for lunches. Going through the motions really.  Little things were upsetting me like that the supermarket only had wraps that has to be eaten within three days of opening - they would have to last 6! They also didn't have a great re-seal so that meant I would have to fish my old packet out of the backpacker bin when I got back.

I sat down on a bench overlooking the Bay - it was beautiful but right at that moment in time I couldn't enjoy it. I had a bit of a cry and then texted Pete, telling him I was thinking of coming home, at the same time saying that I knew the Northland forests were tough and not all of the forests would be like that, and I should just do one more section to see how I fared. He didn't text back straight away so I got myself together went back to the Pickled Parrot and got my blog up to date. I was fighting with Blogger that was insisting that the photos posted in different sized formats and was losing the battle when my phone rang - Pete.

He is a diamond that man. Even though I knew that he would much prefer I came home, he talked me through a mindset that would help me keep going. Yes, I'm here for the challenge but I'm also here to see the New Zealand bush and the country side, which I can't do if the trail I'm on is so demanding that I can't lift my head from my feet. We talked about how beautiful Raetea was in the morning of my exit and we talked about it being very Ok to skip bits due to my body needing a break or to crappy weather etc. So at the moment I'm not coming home just yet.

Then I posted my blog update and started to receive comments from friends about how awesome I was doing (when I definately wasn't feeling very awesome) which helped immensely and little by little I found my mojo coming back.

I did very little today, mainly rested. I went into town again and managed to find a jeweller to fix my chain which had got caught in my pack strap and broke.

Very late this afternoon I got a message through from Hariett and Alex. They had got a lift to Keri Keri so hadn't done the third forest either! This made me feel better, obviously because they too had found it relentless enough to give the next section a miss, but also because they were behind me and I knew sooner or later they would catch me and I would see them again.

I was walking down the street to grab some dinner when who should I see but Stefan! SNAP! His phone had died so he had no navigation or trail notes. Someone offered him a lift to Paihia. CRAZY.

I am heading out tomorrow - not going too far - just around the corner to Opua where I have a resupply box- only a few kms so that shouldn't take long should it?

Pigeon xx

1 comment:

  1. Good on you Leslie!! I'm so proud to be able to call you a friend. You are doing an amazing thing!!
    <3 <3

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