After spending a week in Auckland before starting the trail, it was finally time to set out on the journey. I took a plane to Invercargill, in the south of the South Island, and from there I hitched a ride to Bluff, where the trail begins. Hitchhiking wasn’t my original plan, but after finding out that I should have booked the shuttle service a day in advance—which I hadn’t done—I had no other option. Luckily, after just a few minutes, I was picked up by Maxi, an Argentinian guy who had been in New Zealand for a year and had arrived with zero knowledge of English. His English was actually quite good, considering he had started learning only a year ago. It was also a great opportunity for me to brush up on my Spanish, so we had a fun conversation in Spenglish—a mix of Spanish and English.

After a short ride, I was there—standing at Stirling Point, the southern tip of the South Island and the beginning of the Te Araroa Trail. I took a few pictures and then went to set up my tarp at the nearby campsite. It felt like the end of the world. It was a bit surreal to think that I was going to live only with the things in my backpack for the next four months. I was also really happy to be there, knowing that my planned adventure was finally becoming real. My main mission was hiking 3000 km from Bluff to Cape Reinga, but my brother decided to give me some side “side quests” that I had to complete during the trail to make it more fun. Some of them were location specific, some of them were silly, and some of them were crucial for the world peace and order - such as throwing the ring to Mordor (which I am going to write about later in this series).

With a mix of excitement and uncertainty about what awaited me, I went to sleep.

Mai i te punga ki te hiku

The title in Māori means “from the anchor to the tail.” According to Māori legend, the South Island of New Zealand is a canoe, and the North Island is a fish. Since I was heading northbound, I was going from the anchor of this canoe to the head of the giant fish. Hikers call this direction NOBO, while the southbound direction is SOBO.

I started my big journey on the morning of January 31, 2025, and I was curious how long it would take me to meet the first hikers going my way. I didn’t have to wait long—only a few hundred meters from the beginning of the trail, I met Chintamani (or Chintz) and Nick. Chintz was a young girl from New Zealand who had just finished high school and wanted to get to know her country better. Nick was her aunt, who decided to accompany her for the first few days on the trail. It was great to spend my first day with other hikers. The boring road section from Bluff to Invercargill passed quickly, and we even met some hikers going in the opposite direction—those just finishing the trail after several months of effort. Something that was still far ahead of us.

My time with Nick and Chintz was also a great introduction to Kiwi lingo. I quickly learned there were some quirks. For example, when Nick talked about hiking thousands of kilometers and developing trail leeks, she wasn’t referring to growing vegetables but actually meant trail legs—a term hikers use when their legs turn into something like kilometer-eating machines. However, this idea (have a look here) of leeks haunted me for the rest of the trail. Don’t you think it’s a bit scary?!

Mud, mud, mud… mud everywhere

On the third day of the trail, I was about to face the final boss of all SOBO hikers - the Longwood Forest. Unfortunately for me, I had to fight this boss right at the beginning of my quest, with almost zero trail XP. Longwood is famous for its ridiculous amount of mud. Like most of New Zealand’s forests, it resembles a rainforest — lush, green, and dense, making it almost impossible to go off-trail. So when there’s mud on the narrow path, you either need to grow long legs to step over it or embrace the mud and get dirty. The first option isn’t something most people can achieve on the spot, but I’ve been working on it my whole life - and at 194 cm, I was able to pull off some decent anti-mud gymnastics.

Pro tip: Just embrace the mud.

I quickly learned that you can meet some very interesting people on the trail. Everyone has a unique story and their own motivation for hiking it. One particularly memorable encounter was with a SOBO hiker who looked a bit like a monk. A talisman around his neck and a huge branch as a walking stick gave him some serious Gandalf vibes — but his bare feet made him look more like Frodo Baggins. We talked for a few minutes, and he told me he had walked most of the TA barefoot! His positive energy was absolutely contagious, and the “stick bump” he offered as a goodbye (me with my lightweight carbon trekking poles, him with his heavy wooden branch) gave me a good boost for the rest of the day. Only later did I hear from other hikers who had walked with him that he occasionally “did mushrooms” — so maybe that positivity wasn’t entirely thanks to the magic talisman around his neck.

Crossing the forest took me almost a day and a half, even though it was only 36 km — and I was still going faster than most people! That’s when I realized this trail was going to be no joke. The thought that kept my spirits up was, “2 km/h isn’t fast, but if I keep it up for 10 hours, I’ll be 20 km further”. The second thought was, “embrace the mud”. And that’s exactly how I kept going and got over this muddy beast.

Little did I know that this was only the top of the iceberg and more tricky sections were supposed to come. If you want to know how it continued, you can keep reading here.