Preparing For The Final Push

At the final transition we have a final feed, get into our treking gear and stock up with supplies. We were given a complicated set of instructions/advice at 1.00am in the morning by a slightly pissed Neil Jones and we truly believed we had taken them on board.

Fuelled by the Coke and heaps of advice we tore up the cliff in the dark led by Trev and headed along the ridge with Lea feeling like the need for a sleep. We checked all the markers and soon after leaving the broken trig we spread out a little too far. I must admit I thought we were headed in the wrong direction. When we ended up in an open paddock on the wrong side of the high points we had a team meeting and decided to head back to the last known point. We found a track that wasn't quite pointing in the right direction but were tempted to take. Spirits were a bit low at this point. When I suggested we try the track or head for the road and bail out, Barry replied with a, "That'll mean a DNF and we're not having that!" I knew we would be OK. I suggested Barry and Lea take a breather and have a feed while Trev and I explored the track and off we went. Within 10 minutes we realised this was the way to go so Trev went back to get the troops who may have snuck a few zzzzzz's. I waited alone in the dark! Alone! Feeling a few presences in the bush I went and waited in the open paddock where I and the scary things out there felt much better!

However, it wasn't all over as we had one more moment of getting lost until we stumbled across that legend Neil Jones leading a couple of wahine through the trek as tail end Charlie. What a gentleman! We tagged along and finished strongly through the Toi walk.