Walking on water
1193km
After our luxurious stay at Kelly’s Motel, we continued on Te Araroa; only the route suddenly disappeared underwater. Not unusual in itself, since we had often walked up to our knees through riverbeds in recent weeks. More than once, rivers were the only option to follow the trail, just as now with the Whanganui River. Only this river was 50m wide and 290km long, with perpendicular walls rising high on either side. The cliffs sometimes towered as high as 30m. There was no other option but to walk on water. Or rent a canoe and paddle down the river for eight days.
The three of us decided to rent a kayak and a two-person canoe and alternate between them every day. We got six large waterproof barrels in which we could keep all our stuff dry during the white-water stretches of the river. Since we didn't have to carry everything on our back, we bought lots of extra tasty food for the boat trip: kilos of meat for the fire, fresh fruit and vegetables and lots of chocolate. We also made sure there was enough wine for the evenings along the river.
After a short briefing at the boat rental company, we crept into our wobbly boats and slid on to the Whanganui River. The two vessels were packed heavily with all our things for the long coming week. Of course, we didn’t want to lose anything along the way, so we had tied everything down with long ropes.
If there hadn’t been any current, the paddling would have been quite tough, as the rental boats were not very manoeuvrable. I felt somewhat claustrophobic at first, navigating between the two high cliffs for days.
At one point I was gently paddling downstream by myself in the kayak but suddenly saw one of our storage containers float by. Startled by the sight of our food on the loose, I turned around to see where it had come from. Sunny and Unicorn were nowhere to be seen. It was impossible to paddle back upstream, so I waited for them and lay still, paddling gently against the current. Ten minutes later, the ladies’ boat floated towards me with them swimming next to it.
"Where were you, man?" Sunny shouted angrily. This was not the time for jokes, but their withered wet faces were a sight, and I chuckled to myself. They had hit a rock in rapids, the boat had rolled over, and everything had fallen into the water, including the ladies themselves.
Sunny and Unicorn were still hanging on to the edge of their flooded boat in the deep water, but we slowly drifted to a pebble beach. We pulled the boats ashore and turned the canoe upside down. Everything was wet — phones, iPods, everything — but luckily we hadn’t lost any more containers. I had caught the container with our food just in time. Once on dry land, Sunny and Unicorn could also see the situation’s humour, and we decided to go swimming. After everything had dried, we tied the containers tightly and continued our journey.
After several more rapids, it began to get dark early in the gorge, so we looked for a suitable camping spot. At a beach with a washed-up tree trunk, we tied up the boats and climbed up the bank to drag all our stuff to a small terrace, about 5m above the water.
"A flash flood wouldn’t catch us up here, would it?" I thought to myself. There was just enough space for three tents and a nice flat rock for cooking. We made a campfire from some weathered driftwood and enjoyed our well-deserved meal.
"Cheers!" We raised our cups of wine to celebrate our first day on the water.
The idyllic moment was interrupted by the hum of a speedboat passing by. The bright yellow jetboat sputtered to a halt and docked at our beach, and a man jumped off to secure it. It was incomprehensible to hear what the man was trying to tell us because the engines were still revving, so I scrambled down.
The man crawled back on to his boat and came back carrying a woman up to the beach. Her clothes were soaked, and her face was grey, but she began to come to once she lay on the pebbles.
"I ran into her just around the corner," the man said. "Her canoe was stuck at the rapids. She’s freezing," he said, shaking his head and frantically rubbing her hands to warm them up.
"She nearly drowned! You shouldn’t go down this river alone. It’s going to get a lot rougher in the coming days, with quite a few rapids," said the jetboat driver.
The woman’s small single canoe had caught on a large rock less than 300m from our camping spot. As the man had passed by, he saw the flooded canoe being pressed against the rock by the current. She had nowhere to go.
"She was probably stuck there for an hour or so. You get cold quickly, I can assure you. I’ve lived here all my life, and every year there’s an accident like this," he said. He insisted that she go back to Taumarunui with him, but it suddenly became clear that this German lady had more fire in her than we initially thought. She insisted on carrying on in her canoe; going back was not an option. "Nein, nein, nein." She shook her head and refused to board the jetboat. But going on alone in that shaky one-person vessel was also not an option.
"Then you come with us. You can paddle up front with me," I said, taking a sip of whisky. The jetboat driver offered to take her canoe to the rental company that evening and return the following day with a larger two-person canoe. That way, the four of us could continue the rest of the 170km trip down the river.
Nena from Hamburg and I would get to know each other pretty well over the following days. There wasn’t much space for her tent on the terrace, so we put her in my two-person tent, and she slept like an ox, snoring and all — just my luck.
The following day it rained. The kind jetboat driver had brought a new canoe, and Nena sat in the front with me at the rear. We slowly drifted down the grey Whanganui with large drops of rain dancing on the surface of the water. She asked if we could rest every now and then so she could vape. It turned out that she had just stopped smoking after having consumed two packs a day for 35 years. It soon became clear that she now vaped the equivalent of three packs of cigarettes a day.
"I’m a junkie, I admit it. Vape is now my poison of choice," she stated, smiling back at me.
Later that day, the sun came out again, and we slid further down the river, with Sunny and Unicorn’s other canoe never very far away. During our days in the canoe, Nena and I got to know each other better, and although she was quite set in her ways, I quickly grew fond of her. We spoke about her adventurously wild years during her student life in Berlin. She turned out to be a real punk rocker, and we listened to her favourite ’80s music on my phone. The sound echoed up through the high canyon.
We were about halfway down the river when Midsummer’s Day arrived. December 21 is officially the longest day of the year in New Zealand, and that could only mean one thing: it was "Hike Naked Day". At our last meeting, Goldie and I agreed to both walk naked on Midsummer’s Day — just as we had done a year earlier, walking naked through the Californian mountains. During the Pacific Crest Trail, someone told us that Midsummer’s Day, June 21, was "Hike Naked Day", when you can walk completely naked through nature with your backpack on. Every hiker has the freedom to participate, of course, but who wouldn’t want that?
"Good morning, Nena," I waved as I climbed into the back of the canoe without any clothes on.
"I’m glad I’m in the front," she replied with a big grin.
We had been on the river for almost a week now, and although we only had two days left on the river, it seemed never-ending. The paddling started to frustrate me. We often spent more than eight hours a day on the water, and as we got further downstream, the river got wider and wider. As a result, it got a lot harder to paddle without any current to carry us along. I even began to miss the wild rapids from the beginning of the river a little.
On the penultimate evening, we pulled the canoes up the bank and clambered up the muddy hill to discover some white buildings behind a row of trees.
It turned out to be a tiny settlement called Jerusalem (Hiruharama in Māori), with an old convent along the river — a Catholic nunnery since 1892.
"Welcome. I’m the last one. Who wants a cup of tea?" she said with a radiant smile.
We followed the nun into the white convent building next to the chapel.
"You can choose a bed upstairs in the dormitory; the orphans left years ago."
We climbed the creaky wooden stairs to the first floor and entered a room with 24 beds that looked more like a pre-war hospital than a nursery. Everything was well maintained and in original condition. There were mint green curtains that you could pull around your bed for some 1892-style privacy. Each bed had an old black bible on the bedside table, and pictures of Jesus hung prominently on the wall.
Later, I found the elderly nun reading quietly in the living room downstairs. She was originally from Samoa but had been living in the convent for over 60 years. She told us about the French missionary, Suzanne Aubert, known as Sister Mary Joseph, who founded the order Daughters of Our Lady of Compassion. The Catholic sisterhood took care of the sick and orphans of the Ngāti Hau tribe from the surrounding area.
"Sister, may I ask you something," I asked politely. "Would it be possible for our friend to play the organ in your chapel? She’s a professional organ player in Germany, and we have never heard her play."
"No, please, that’s very inappropriate," Unicorn apologised, embarrassed.
"But of course, my child, I insist. I also play a little myself, but it’s been years since anyone’s played our organ. It would be an honour."
Unicorn carefully lifted the lid of the organ and blew the dust off the keys in the chapel. The dust drifted into the light that shone through the stained-glass windows. She took a brief glance at her feet to assess the foot pumps’ position. The old harmonium was powered by a manual foot pump that produces sound by blowing air through vibrating metal inside the instrument. The sacred room became dead still for a moment, as our organist from Berlin took a seat on the antique organ stool. She sat up straight while her hands hovered above the keys for a moment. She closed her eyes and let her fingers gently touch the keys as the music played.
"Ah, Bach," the nun whispered with a smile. Her eyes were closed too. Sunny and I looked at each other with a look of understanding. Wow, Unicorn! She was good!
The music from 1740 filled the space from 1892, played by a Unicorn born in 1986. I, too, closed my eyes and made a makeshift prayer. I was grateful for this magical moment and the beautiful music. Thankful for the journey and that I’d been safe until now. My thoughts flew to my three beautiful children far, far from here. Count your blessings, mate, count your blessings.
The book
Not Alone: Walking Te Araroa Trail through New Zealand by Tim Voors, photography and illustrations by Tim Voors, published by Bateman Books, RRP $45
