The ninety mile desert coast

The Tasman argues with the Pacific on a bright spring day as I turn south towards The Rocks That Must Be Crossed At Low Tide. Well, here they are...

... to the left of the photo and you can see a ton of useful hillside above them! Te Werahi Beach was a delight, at the right hand end of the picture the route is up and over Herangi (red, exotic) to Twilight Beach. 

This is looking back at Twilight Beach when I left camp at 0630hrs 24 Sep. You can see Herangi in the background and tents at the camp. Scrupulous earnest Canadians hung two full bags of food from the rafters of the cook shelter and I admit I did nothing when I heard possums raiding it all. Schadenfreude. 

Lovely coastal scrub over Scott Point. I didn't know that wild manuka can be pink. 

After an hour or so I reached Captain Cook's desert coast. Here it is. 

The red hill recurs in the Far North. I suspect ultramafic soils. Must do my homework. 

Just over 1 km on Ninety Mile Beach I found this:

It is a satellite transmitter from somebody's study animal! I have emailed the US company and will update when they reply. I speculate it came off a juvenile white shark, I know a few of those tags were never recovered. 


The wildlife I did see were usually dying or dead. Seal pups, gannets, petrels, puffer fish, blue bottles, and this tragic wee prion

It died a few minutes later. And at Maunganui Bluff a band of horses lurked near my camp at dawn. 

All four were bay with black feathers and a flashy high stepping gait. Somebody put a Friesian stallion out there. 

I had two days of 30km to walk each day. I found places to pull off the beach for respite from the roar and to pull my socks off. 

Two young guys from Hawkes Bay started the same day. They are truly suffering. In contrast I smashed out 4 km/hr for 8 hours straight. 
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