Sunrise Walk June 10
Well I made it! After the alarm woke me up at 5.00am I was on my mission. It was such a beautiful morning, lots of stars out so a good sign of a good morning ahead.
I arrived at the Botanic Gardens (in pitch black) and it felt like I had to walk at least a kilometre before I found the queues to register! I was greeted by a very vocal welcome and beautiful smile, it was Maria from Coverstaff! If it wasn't for Maria we wouldn't have known about this amazing event (Coverstaff was one of the sponsors for the event).
As we waited for the formalities to start it was amazing to see how many ladies had registered. Yes, the event was for females only. For those males wanting to know why they weren't allowed, well they were kindly asked to either come and support or my personal favourite, support your partner by staying home and looking after the kids for a few hours!
The Manager of Hospice South Auckland welcomed us all, then a local kaumatua blessed this inaugural event with a prayer. We then heard a few words from the Mayor of Manukau City, Len Brown. Then we were introduced to the reigning Olympic and Commonwealth Champion Shot Putter from little old NZ - Valerie Vili. If you don't know, Valerie is the current Hospice Ambassador and she explained to us why she has a special commitment to hospice dating back to when her mother was cared for there in 2000.
Then it was 'WARM UP' time, 3 ladies got up on stage to give us all a quick 5 minute warm up before we started. It was good fun and everyone got into the spirit of things while warming up our bodies to the sounds of 'Celebration' by Kool & the Gang. Then it was time to head to the start line, Valerie headed the crowd and we were off at 7.02am.
We had such a scenic environment to walk through not only in the Botanic Gardens but also Totara Park. I only live 5 minutes away and this was the first time I'd walked through these areas properly. The 10km walk went sooooo quickly and before we knew it we only had about 10 minutes to go to cross the finish line... That however doesn't mean the walk was easy!! On no! Try 4 lots of steps that seemed to extend to the heavens, I mean STEPS... lots of steps, the going down steps were totally easy peazy lemon squeezy it was the ones going up and up and up and... I think you get my drift! Someone started counting and gave up after reaching 100 and that was only the 1st lot!
It was good fun and everyone got into the spirit of things while warming up to the sounds of 'Celebration'...
Anyway I think not knowing what lay ahead in our walk was better than waiting for them to appear! You know that saying "What you don't know won't hurt you!" Anyway trying to take in the native bush we were walking through, all the nikau, the gorgeous streams and realising, hey we're still in the city, made your walk that much easier to do. 1 hour 10 minutes later (8.15am) we all looked at each other and Melissa said lets run the last 100 metres so that's exactly what we did. And who was there to greet us at the finish line? Maria from Coverstaff and... ex Silver Fern Vilimaina Davu (she was an amazing defender on the netball court to watch, she played in my favourite position GK - goal keep... mean DEFENCE mean!) And I can't forget Ron Gleave was there at the end for support. Sorry Ron for making you take all those photos for us... hehe...
Warmest regards Arohanui
LeeAnne Hau
Photo: Left to right: Melissa Beets, Valerie Vili, LeeAnne Hau
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