Epic Hikes of the World ( PDFDrive )

© Ryan Stuart
cloud threatens to envelop Nauro village
Our starting point at the Northern Beaches village of Buna now seems a
different world. Just a few days before, I was ticking off tropical clichés as I sat on
a crooked palm tree watching local kids play and scream in the crystal-blue water.
An old fisherman dragged his nets into his canoe in the distance, and a local
woman – Jean – cleaned her pots at the shore with a mixture of sand and leaves.
The village sits at the water’s edge. Sand stained light grey from distant volcanic
eruptions creeps out to sea a few metres before falling off to near white, giving the
water its magical blue colouring. Aside from being a startlingly beautiful place to
acclimatise to the tropical conditions (and a rare opportunity to spend a few days
living amongst locals in a Papua New Guinean village) there are other reasons to
start here. Buna and its neighbouring villages were the site of the initial Japanese
beach landings at the start of the Kokoda campaign in July 1942, during WWII.
Attempting to attack the capital, Port Moresby in the south, Japanese forces chose
the Kokoda track as their route. Predominantly Australian Allied forces launched a
counter-offensive from Moresby and the two sides each gained and lost significant
ground along almost the entire length of the track over six months. The campaign
ended with a Japanese withdrawal from these same beaches.