A golf caddy is walking the entire length of New Zealand while carrying two golf bags full of clubs for charity.
Dougie Haynes, who is originally from Oxford, has lived and worked in Aotearoa New Zealand for the past five years and caddies at two of the country’s most prestigious golf courses.
On 25 October he set off from the northernmost tip of the Pacific nation’s North Island, Cape Reinga, for the six month journey southward to Bluff, at the bottom of the South Island.
Dougie said he had been inspired to take on the 3,000km (1,900-mile) Te Araroa Trail after seeing thousands of hikers pass through his home town of Mangawhai on the route.
“At the start of each summer I’ve watched a couple of hundred to a thousand people go through town doing the trail, and I thought ‘I want to do that one year’,” he told BBC Radio Oxford.
“This was the year to do it and, in a moment of madness, I chose to put the golf clubs on my shoulder.”
The golf caddy has already taken in some of the North Island’s most iconic sites, including Mount Ngauruhoe and Mount Ruapehu [Dougie Haynes]
The 31-year-old has now been walking along the trail for more than three months – all while carrying the two golf bags, which can weigh up to 15kg (33lbs) each.
“I’ve worked as a golf caddy for six years now, and that was the inspiration really for for carrying the clubs,” he said.
Dougie is attempting to raise $50,000 NZD (£22,000) for two charities close to his heart: a New Zealand-based organisation called Kids Can and the UK mental health charity Mind.
“I had a very close friend of mine who passed away when I was 22. He was 23 and was getting a lot of help through Mind, who do great work for people with mental health,” he said.
Dougie started the 3,000km (1,900-mile) trek in October [Dougie Haynes]
Despite moving “a little slower” than the majority of hikers on the trail due to his extra luggage, the golf caddy now has fewer than 90 days remaining on his trek.
He spoke to the BBC from the town of Havelock – near the top of the South Island – and said the journey was “going by at a very rapid rate”.
“But that finish line is still quite a long way away, so it’s still a long, long endeavour,” he said.
Along the Te Araroa, Dougie said there were volunteers, called Trail Angels, who “open their homes, their gardens, their kitchens to people on the trail and basically let us all stay there”.
“It’s been absolutely amazing and humbling. I’ve known how amazing the country of New Zealand, and its community, is, but it’s gone to another level being on this trail,” he said.
The 31-year-old also visited the Beehive in Wellington, which is home to New Zealand’s parliament [Dougie Haynes]
“There will certainly be a break from treading the path of the links when I finish,” Dougie said.
“But I’m sure I’ll get back on the course pretty quickly after that.”
He added that he was looking forward to returning Oxfordshire’s “pleasant hills” in the summer, where he was hoping to catch an Oxford United game, which he had been “missing for the last six years”.
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