Alex walks for six days and then has a day off. He wants to cover 50km a day along this stretch of coast.
He has been having some trouble with his left knee and was glad to rest up on Sunday.
"One of the great things about places like Whanganui was a friend gave me the number of surgeon John van Dalen and I rang him and got some advice about my knee.
"That's just cool, and wouldn't happen many other places."
His 32 year old body has been holding up reasonably well apart from the knee.
"There's some tiredness, and sore feet, but that's expected."
Sustainable Coastlines wants to help people look after the "coastlines and waterways they love".
"It is not about being confrontational - we want everyone to enjoy our coastlines and look at ways that people can work together.
"There may be people who want to see more trees along an area of coastline where there is farmland and a farmer who is willing to plant more trees on that land, so we want to encourage people to work together to achieve their aims" Alex said.
For the charity trek he trained in his home town of Auckland by running from where he lives in Kingsland to the Waitakere Ranges regularly. It didn't prepare him though for running over the stony west coast beaches.
Mr Ashton has a support crew of family and friends travelling alongside him and his progress can be tracked online at trackme.kiwi/event/publicview/303.
There is also a Facebook page and a givealittle page at givealittle.co.nz/fundraiser/straittocape.