Day 82 - Hanmer Springs

It’s going to be a short day today. I have only 15km of trail left until I hit a highway from which I’ll hitch to the closest town of Hanmer Springs. Todays weather was forecasted to be hectic, full of high winds and rain. For now it was a light drizzle. 

The track was easy enough and I hit the highway by 10am. Hitching went smoothly and I was there for lunch. I arrived only to remember that it is a long weekend. Waitiga Day is today, NZ’s equivalent of Canada Day weekend. Fortunately Hanmer is a tourist town and was completely booked out. Perfect. Some friends and I managed to find a place to pitch our tent in a holiday park 2km out of town. It was a tough walk carrying our latest heavy food resupply and cases of beer. 

In the night the forecasted wind actually came. It must have been gusting close to 90km/hr. I braced my tent with my hiking poles and it managed to stay upright through the night.