Hike: 23km, 400m

Yippee, a glorious day! Scott cooked the porridge as I'd burnt it yesterday (why is it men are better at outdoor cooking?) and we set off at a march to make sure we met our 3:30 ferry at the end of the walk to take us back to Picton.

At the half way mark we were 2 1/2 hours up on the indicated walking time so we slowed our march and enjoyed the views which were awesome today. The sunshine meant that the sea looked greener than our previous days and the walk wound in and out of a forest canopy. We saw many mountian bikers on the walk too and it tickled our fancy somewhat - we may seek some out later in the trip.

We reached Anakiwa at 1:30 so there was no need for us to have worried. But on the plus side the weather was glorious so we had time for a swim and a coffee and scone at the Blist'd Foot Cafe! Back at the jetty our ferry turned out to be an hour late (the ferry was waiting for two people further up the track who had taken a wrong turn - last we heard they hadn't found them yet!) On the jetty we got chatting to John Jacobson from Chicago (who was waiting for the same ferry and who'd we'd seen a few times on the walk) who was on his way home from the SOuth Pole and Project Icecube! He was an astrophysicist and said it was very surreal to be descibing the neutrino detection experiment whilst on a beautiful pier in New Zealand! He was a really interesting guy and we looked at his South Pole photos on the ferry.

Back in Picton and our lovely hostel we had dinner (with fresh vegetables - yum), a shower and aired the tent and all our bedding. We enjoyed the pleasures of a sofa and trashy magazines before sleep.