799 kilometers and scratched legs

In 2010 I hiked El Camino Francés. It’s 800 kilometers long from Saint Jean Pied de Port in France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. I remember the feeling of walking on sore feet into the big square in front of the cathedral after 20 days…I felt totally invincible! I’m 1 kilometer from that distance along Te Araroa, and still I’ve got 2200 kilometers to walk. 2200! I don’t know if you understand how far that is…I’m sure I don’t. 

I don’t know what I expected before I came here. I spoke to my mom this morning (loved to hear her voice after all these weeks!) and she asked me if the trail is as I thought it would be…I have no idea.

Since October 30 when I started together with my new Danish friend Rune at Cape Reinga, it’s been more ups and downs that I can count and I’ve probably had all the feeling that possibly exist in a human body. Despite all the pain and suffering that naturally come with hiking 800 kilometers (especially when you scratch your legs very bad in the bushes as I did the other day…), the biggest feeling of them all is FREEDOM.

Scarred but free.

It’s hard to explain how it feels to wake up in the morning without an alarmclock in a slightly cold and damp tent to the singing of hundreds of birds, without having a clue what day it is and even don’t care about it at all. All you have to care about is getting out of the sleeping bag, pack your things, make porridge and coffee on the stove and walk to your new home for the night. You don’t know what awaits you, how it looks on the other side of next hill or who you meet along the way. So far, not two days have looked the same…something new happens each and every day and some days  I’ve felt like I’ve been walking in a different country than yesterday. Surreal.

 

Home sweet home…
 
I don’t know how I ever will be able to share my story with you…I don’t even understand it myself. It feels like I’m waking in a dream, sometimes a sweet and a very few times a nightmare…I haven’t really yet understood that I’m actually here now, doing what I’ve dreamt about for such a long time. At the same time, my home and my life in Stockholm seem so far away that it feels like I’ve been here forever. It’s funny how fast you adapt to a new life, I’ve only been here for about 6 weeks!

Anyway, I can’t tell you everything that have happend so far even though I want to. I need to figure out a way to do it…in the meantime, I let the pictures talk for themselves. 

 

Leaving Auckland…a few days later, I left my friends…
 
 
Freedom!
 
 
One of my biggest challenges: swingbridges.
 
 
On top of every steep hill: the reward.
 
 
Te Araroa: = a 3000 km obstacle race.
 
 
Never forget.
 

Until next time…

14,345 thoughts on “799 kilometers and scratched legs”

  1. Pingback: 799 kilometer och sönderriven - Health by HelenaHealth by Helena

  2. Just keep going, the first 1,000 km are just a warm up and everything will just get better!
    After 2,000 you know how your body, especially your feet stand up to the repeated hard work and you find your zone. Where you can just go and go forever…
    After 5,000 you stop keeping track of every thousand, and after 10, 000 you stop counting all together!
    🙂
    Keep walking

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