Another morning up early and reading in Cuzzie. It is nice to be awake before the sun, I feel I have managed to steal extra hours for me and my day! It is a habit I doubt will ever leave me. I prop myself up in the dark of Cuzzie, grab my book, tuck myself warmly into my sleeping bag and read a couple more chapters, oh and check the weather. As predicted all the bad stuff heading our way was arriving, but pre sunrise it was still fairly calm. The tide was out so the waves all sounded small compared to earlier this week but it was just a teaser. MN was pretending to be improving but it was all due to change.

Reading a book is strange for me. I feel an incredible urge to just get up and go for a run or a big walk but I make myself read. This book has some inner meaning and I relate to a lot of what he has written. It did feel great to be warm and inside Cuzzie, it felt like a good day was dawning. It is about 8.30 by the time I headed in to brew myself a coffee. I had got things sorted inside the campervan and I only had a couple of things to grab from off the kitchen table and to unhook from the power supply.

After a large cup of coffee, some brekkie and a chat, things were planned for a rendezvous in the next couple of days, and I then was on the road north. I was wanting to see what lay ahead of me on this next paddle and the options I had if I needed to call the days ahead paddling short. I for once wanted to see my landings and the coast I was to paddle past, normally it is not a pleasure. The drive today did take a wee while to get back to where I had landed, thanks to Nat this was made really easy as she had marked it on Google maps. Once I eventually arrived at this marked destination. I sat and looked out at the ocean and the waves, it was looking choppy, the wind and rain was arriving. All was as predicted and I was pleased to be on land.

I kept heading north along the roads, pulling into a couple of locations that had been recommended to me as options for an earlier pull in. They looked okay but now it is all dependant on what the weather and wind is doing on the day. I could be blessed and have a smooth landing and then again MN could throw me from the top of a wave and dump me on the beach wet and covered in sand! I know which option I would prefer.

I headed up past Little Wanganui, over the winding roads to Karamea, all the while looking at the native trees and amazed at how green and refreshed they all looked from the rain. As I drove the road climbed up and over the steeper sections and it took a little while to see the coast again. It had calmed this morning and was a little flatter due to the wind direction but it was not making me wish I had hit the water today. I was damn glad to have listened to my stomach and my inner self. This weather would have turned early and it would have been a nasty day. As I looked towards the end of the road I could see Kohaihai Bluff and soon I got to the end of the road. This is where I plan to reach on my next paddle so I check out the beach landing. It is, how would I say, marginally okay, but the wind is now blowing hard, it is making the waves stand up and is blowing spray backwards off them. It is really cool to look at but not a paddlers friend.

I turn my thoughts back to setting up to camp and I locate a great place to park Cuzzie, next to this really big stone picnic table and a stone built fireplace. I am in heaven, a fire. I go driftwood collecting and really soon I get the fire lit and blazing just as it is getting dark. As soon as it starts to burn I feel happy and the warmth of the fire is bliss. I manage to cook all of my dinner in and on the fire tonight and I succeed to be sitting inside eating just as the rain starts to fall really heavily and the wind picks up to rock Cuzzie about.

Yes another day over, another day off the water. I ask myself “what is my hurry?” Actually none. A really inspiring young man recently said "don’t hurry this odyssey, this circumnavigation of our beautiful and diverse isles, it is merely the beginning. What you believe to be 'completion' is actually the 'start'" this is now embedded in my mind.

As I write this blog, I am sitting like this morning, curtains drawn, snugly wrapped in my sleeping bag, a freshly heated hot water bottle and my large cup of fresh Kawakawa tea with lashings of local honey. I am listening to the rain fall, the sound of the crashing waves as the tide rolls in and the gust of winds rocking Cuzzie. The wind and the waves, they now are part of me and seem to help me sleep at night.

My smiles today:
Being awake before the sun, I love it.
My crazy little world of discovery, every day I am on a new road and seeing a new sight.
Another burning hot fire.
Rain on my roof as I go to sleep tonight.
New and old Friends raising money for the MHFNZ, thank you, you are all incredible.
My $2 hot water bottle, thanks Reg for making me buy it.
Counting the days that I have been unable to paddle, A NEW RECORD achieved!

My thoughts today:
Life is about the people you meet and the things you create with them, so go out and start creating, live your dream and wear your passion. Life is short.

Good night from Red and Cuzzie. Ma Te Wa