Day 61 – St. Arnaud

Today is a “zero day,” one of the more revealing terms in the through-hiker’s jargon.  It means a day of rest, one in which no hiking was done, and to a mind that measures everything in kilometers, it is a big zero.  Of course, through-hikers take zero days all the time, but there is always a vague puritanical guilt involved.

I whiled away the rainy day playing on the internet, visiting the tiny shop repeatedly for such luxuries as broccoli and bananas, and chatting with the hotel clerk.  The clerk was a gregarious woman in her sixties, and the only person I found in the whole town who knew much about the Richmond Range and the Red Hills, my upcoming destination.  She described it as exceedingly beautiful and rugged, and said that not many hikers get up there, though she didn’t really know why.  It used to be her old stomping grounds when she lived in Nelson.

In the afternoon the weather cleared briefly and I went for a walk along Lake Rotoiti, incidentally picking up a few kilometers of walkable track that I had missed yesterday when the DoC worker shuttled me across the unwalkable Roberts Road.  So technically today was not quite a zero day.

I’m still on the fence about whether to wait and see if my package arrives tomorrow afternoon.  It would kill most of the day, but it would save me a lot of hassle, and I would eat better than if I tried to cobble together a resupply from the country store here.