Happy thanksgiving for us! We got up early and hit the trail all anxious to get back to civilization. We found out a bus came to Rainbow Reach a DOC site on the river and the first part of the trail accessible by a long gravel road that would cut 2hrs off our hike back to the control gates. We did not have a reservation and did not know if the bus dropped you off in Te Anau or at the control gates or how much it cost but we were all anxious and wanted to be there in time to find out. We hit the trail and about an hour in we reached Rainbow Reach, after much debate Paul, Jeff, and Justin said they would run the last 5 miles to the control gates and get the van to pick up me, Kasey, and Ben and all of our packs.
While we were waiting Craig and Roy hung out and we chatted some more. Roy gave me his phone number and told me that Paul and I could stay for free when and if we go to Australia! It is a good thing the guys ran to the van because the bus that came was tiny and would have only sat the 6 of us and there was a lot of others waiting for it. When Craig and Roy left on the bus back to town, Ben, Kasey, and I solved the worlds problems while passing around our small "peanut" rugby ball. Soon we heard Serena's horn a honk'n and we see the rest of our group hanging out her window coming down the road. Yay, they made it! When we inspected Serena closer we saw that the young Germans we met on the trail four days ago wrote "space ship" on our girl like they told us they did with their van. Cheeky Germans!
After we were all loaded in we got a camp site, set up our tents and drove straight to the local bakery to get meat pies and ice cream! There is nothing like a meat pie after 4 days of raman noodles! Next stop was the grocery store for our thanksgiving feast, 3 small pre cooked chickens, veggies, bread, and some potatoes to mash! After a nice shower Jeff, Kasey, and Justin took a nap, while Paul, Ben and I went into the lounge area, I started to blog, Paul and Ben had their books, it was not long before Ben started to snore and was out on the lounge couch. That left Paul and I, the sole survivors of the Kepler tramp!
The feast was not quite thanksgiving in the states but good for our limited shopping options and kitchen appliances. The garlic mashed potatoes turned out well considering we mashed them with a fork, the chickens were in the oven, and Justin was in charge of stuffing…the meal was wonderful, however the stuffing got tossed, it was burned on the outside and doughy in the middle, non of us knew quite how to cook it since it had the consistency of bisquick. After some boxed wine and chocolate for desert, we had the group finalize what they wanted to do with the rest of there time here. They decide to drive up the west coast, spend a couple days in Abel Tasman, drive to Kaikoura and swim with dolphins, then we will drive them to the Blenhiem Airport, they all changed their flights and it was set. It feels great to have our plan in place! Now off to bed for our early raise and drive to Milford Sound.
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