It was a really moving moment, says the woman walking the dog, Bagho, who was, she says, “Jordan’s little mate, his best friend.”

“It’s heartening when complete strangers recognise Bagho. If kind wishes could bring Jordan home, he would have been back long ago.”

Jordan van Deursen, a 29-year-old Waihi man, took Bagho for a Sunday walk on that same track in Wentworth Valley, near Whangamatā five months ago on October 29.

He never came back.

Bagho was missing along with Jordan for nine weeks, until he mysteriously walked out of the bush on New Year’s day, nine weeks after the pair had set off on their walk, and at the other side of the range, 6.5 km away.

The dog had lost weight, and had bloody paws, but could give no clue as to what had happened to his beloved owner.

“His mother can’t even talk about it. She’s devastated. Beside herself. We all are, going through hell everyday. Not knowing is the worst. Different scenarios go through your head - and believe me we’ve been through every single one. Now I don’t let myself go there - I still believe he’s in the Wentworth Valley. I keep my focus on finding him. Bringing him home.”

She organises regular searches in the dense bush around the track. The most recent one was on March 4.

“Strangers come and help. From as far as Hamilton and Tauranga. They’ve become friends. They’re all hunters - and we search like hunters.”

Apart from Bagho, not one piece of evidence has been found.

The official search organised by police was closed in November.

“I’ll always think that was too soon. We’re grateful to them and they did an amazing job. But we don’t know why they stopped. When some people go missing, there’s so much attention. Jordan it seems, he’s been forgotten.”

“What gets me is that it’s a popular track. Once I sat at the entrance for six hours in the pouring rain, waiting for one of the hunters. I saw an endless stream of people going in and out, even on a wet day.

“It’s strange that not one person has come forward, who saw Jordan and Bagho walking. A guy with big bushy hair and a cute little rascal of a dog. Someone must remember.”

The day Jordan embarked on the fateful walk, he’d met his mother for lunch, who was spending some days in Whangamatā. He went to Port Road to buy his favourite chocolate biscuits, and told his mum he was taking the dog for a walk.

He was wearing a light jersey, shorts, and hiking style boots. He parked his vehicle at the entrance to Wentworth track where he ate some of the biscuits, and the dog had some pie.

“We know this as he left half of them in the car, and he loved those biscuits. He would have been coming back to eat them. It wasn’t a hard track - it wasn’t like he was going on a hike - he would have been going for a hour or so. He’d never stayed overnight in the bush.”

That Sunday evening, it was rainy and windy, with the weather was getting wilder over the next days, as the tail of ex-tropical cyclone Lola lashed the north of Aotearoa, with Coromandel bearing the brunt of heavy rain.

It wasn’t until the next day, Monday, when a staff member from the camp site noticed the car had been there all night, that police were alerted.

Jordan had only just moved to Waihi, so didn’t know many people, and used to often be out with the dog, so it wasn’t until Wednesday November 1 that family was also contacted police.

Police then launched a large-scale rescue operation with police, LandSAR, Fire and Emergency and locals.

Although the track itself is well trodden, the surrounding bush is thick and rugged, and riddled with mineshafts hazards all over the peninsula.

The wet weather meant tracks that might have led to Jordan and Bagdo, a shoe or paw print, were washed away.

On November 20 police made the decision to suspend it.

Volunteer teams organised by Oliver continued, but it was like “the rest of the world moved on, forgot they were still lost”, says the family friend.

Then, on December 30, Jordan’s mother received a phone call from a woman visiting the Coromandel for a New Year’s Eve party.

“A dog had come out of the bush at the other end of the range, and wandered into a house. It was just luck that someone recognised him, and took a photo. It was Bagho.”

The house where he wandered in was at Maratoto, inland from Whangamatā, and close to a bush track exit.

The Maratoto track, a 4wd track, and Old Wires walking track connect up to Wentworth valley at Hikutaia just out of Thames.

The exit Bagho appeared would be around a 6.5 hour walk through the bush from where they first entered.

Search and rescue scoured the area taking Bagho with them, but there was no sign of Jordan.

“Bagdo’s a trooper. We take him on all the searches with us. I put GPS around his neck so he doesn’t run off. He hasn’t got excited in any particular area. But we keep trying. With all the attention he gets, he thinks he’s the cats pyjamas,“ says the family spokesperson.

Bagho running off is the theory the family believe likely.

“If he sped into the scrub off the track, Jordan would have chased him. Maybe he got lost or fell or...”

When the search was called off an officer told her they thought Jordan had ”succumbed to his injuries.“

The family is adamant Jordan did not intend to disappear.

“He was a much loved cruisey guy. Everybody loved him. He didn’t have many friends in Waihi as he’d just moved there, but he was a happy boy - really kind. There’s no way that Jordan would deliberately put Bagho in any danger - he loved that dog more than anything.”

Waikato East Area Investigations Manager Senior Sergeant Kristine Clarke, says there has been nothing to suggest Jordan was the victim of foul play.

“Police believe that Jordan has become lost and or suffered a fall or injury which rendered him incapable of making his way out of the area. He did not have a cell phone or any means of calling for assistance and was not equipped for anything more than a short walk,” she says.

“Conditions changed within a few hours of Jordan setting off on his walk, with a severe storm coming in which impacted the area for 48 hours. Rivers and creeks rose quickly to well above their normal levels and would have been treacherous for anyone attempting to cross them.

The bush in the area is thick and dense with steep drop offs and a person could become disorientated very quickly if they strayed off the designated tracks.“

Police have got another search planned, she says.

While social media has been a useful tool to coordinate searches, it’s also been the place of gossip or rumour.

It’s almost 35 years since the Coromandel bush had a missing persons case that made global headlines, but the ghosts of Swedish backpackers Urban Hoglin and Heidi Paakkonen have never really left the bush.

Locals couldn’t help mentioning them when Jordan’s disappearance became an ongoing mystery.

The tourists had also left their car at the start of a bush walk in 1989.

Two years later, Hoglin’s body was found in the bush near Whangamatā. David Tamihere, convicted of their murders, has remained adamant he did not do it. Despite decades of investigations, searches, books and podcasts, Paakkonen’s body has never been found.

Not finding Jordan is not an option the family spokesperson considers.

“I will never give up. For his mum, family, for Bagho. If there’s anyone out there thinks of anything, please say. Someone can’t disappear off the face of the earth.

We have to bring him home. Until then, the only thing driving me, is where is Jordan.“