Three Weeks of (very worthwhile) Hell on Earth

Outward Bound, Anakiwa, Marlborough Sounds

February 2007

Warning: Contains 3,000 words of superfluous waffle, plus photos (and eventually maps)
Initially, I signed up to Outward Bound for two reasons. One was that it would allow me to complete both the residential and expedition training components of my Gold Duke of Edinburghs award at once. The other was that it gave me something to work towards in getting off the anti-depressants I had been on all winter.

Arriving at Picton, I was met by a whole crowd of other people being herded about by tanned, fit-looking people who were obviously instructors. My group (all those doing a “Classic” course) got to dump their bags in a truck and then go and wait for a water taxi, while a group of 14 had to change into activity-suitable gear and load themselves and their luggage on to an awesome-looking sail boat. Yikes! There was much discussion amongst the group I wound up sitting with as to what would happen to us on arrival. Some of the talk was near paranoia, including the suggestion that the boat would stop away from the jetty and we would be required to swim in to the beach at Anakiwa…

On our eventual arrival, we were greeted by a powhiri, and then separated into our watch groups. After some really nutty getting to know you games, we were introduced to our bunkroom for the duration of the course and suddenly (and eventually at the same time) it was dinner!

The first few days of the course were definitely the most mentally challenging. When we went tramping, I overloaded myself with kit because I was experienced – giving no thought to the heat and terrain we were heading for. The actual stuff we took tramping was a revelation though – because we had small packs and huge sleeping bags, plus large cookers (cooking for 14 at once), there was almost no space for personal belongings. For an overnight tramp I took one dry set of shorts, top, bra and underwear, a beanie and gloves, a warm jersey and my raincoat. There was no space for anything else!!

Our overnight navigation tramp took us up a steep hill, in the sunshine, on the hottest day we saw through the entire course. I was miserable. Because we wouldn’t see water for the entirety of our trip (no rivers up the hill, and no hut with a water tank), we had to carry all the water we would need for drinking, cooking and cleaning for two full days. This meant each person was carrying about 6L of water, which for a lot of people (myself included) was a lot too much weight!

After eventually successfully navigating our way out of the bush it was back to camp to prepare for the next adventure! Part of our descent had included a steep, slippery mud path, lined with gorse bushes. Wouldn’t you know, I slipped over. And I did what came naturally – put out my hand to catch myself, and instead all I managed to do was slice my palm open!



From there, the next trip was white water kayaking. For me personally, this was the hardest thing I had to do. Even though I’m a strong swimmer, I had a paranoia that I was going to get caught under the water. Day one was fine, I had a great time!



Day two dawned with a feeling of dread that I just couldn’t shake, and it took the entire day to get myself relaxed enough that I stopped tipping out at nearly every rapid! Of course, it wasn’t helped that I knew there was a substantial run to complete to get back to the bus, which was parked 8km back up the river… I’m not a good runner, at all, and I was immensely shamed when the group was forced to run at my pace for the first couple of km’s, and felt worse again that those who got to the bus before me had to run back to me so that everyone finished together. I admit though, that it gave those who were stronger runners more of a challenge, which was good, but that day I would rather have gone home than have had to do that run…

Running continued to be my biggest challenge – the morning after the kayak trip my morning run for PT was horrific. So bad, in fact that I wanted to just go home!! Thankfully that day we did an activity that bought back the positive for me. Called the “life run” it was about who you were, and who you wanted to be. Some of it was hard – “10 things you like about yourself” nearly didn’t happen, “10 things you’d like to change about yourself” was hard to limit – but other bits were relieving, making me feel much better about myself.

Other "smaller" things we did included high ropes, rock climbing and swimming from the other side of the sound back to Anakiwa beach...





Soon enough it was time to go off for a service project. Ours was cutting and shifting wood for a gentleman who then gave that wood away to poor elderly locals. He was neat, and had a cool museum of all sorts of old farm stuff, which we got a tour of on the second day. We stayed overnight in the paddock next to a cobb cottage, which we helped clean out and weed around as well. The work was hard and hot! I discovered that I wasn’t that good with an axe, so I stuck to moving wood around for those who were chopping it instead. I still worked up a wicked hunger and was really glad of the really cold swimming hole we found before dinner!

After a second day chopping and shifting wood, it was off back to Anakiwa, stopping about 6km out for another long run. Yikes! I managed to survive, although was still the slowest in the watch, and Oh the shame of having a truck moving with you at your slow pace with a sign on the back saying “Caution: Runners” when you are the only one any overtaking vehicle would see! I got quite bad cramp in both calf muscles, but kept going because stopping was not really an option. In fact, once the rest of the crew were running back to meet me, I was moving quite well again, and I remember some of them being shocked when they had slowed down to walk with me (because it was all I could manage) to suddenly find themselves well behind me! I may not be a good runner, but I am a fierce walker!

Thankfully our next big activity was sailing, so there was plenty of time to rest sore bodies from chopping and hauling wood! We spent three days out on the water, and got all the way out to Cook Straight in that time. The first day we had brilliant sunshine and were all keen for a swim during the day.



Later in the evening, the wind dropped, meaning we had to start rowing (no motors on these boats!), and then it got dark, and then it started raining… By the time we got to our designated campsite for the night and moored the boat, we were all soaked and it was near on midnight! We also soon discovered that we had managed to break the only cooker we had, so there was no hot food for dinner. Oops!



Day two of the sailing saw me and a couple of others swimming out to retrieve the boat and row it back in to the shore to pick up the others, followed by a compulsory jump off the instructors launch for everyone. Having had no hot food for dinner or breakfast meant that what sunshine we had didn’t manage to warm us very well, and all of us spent the entire rest of our sailing experience in our warm PVC raincoats!



We headed off to Ship Cove for lunch, there finding another watch who were also out sailing and who generously offered us some of their gas so we could cook lunch. We carefully put said gas well away from where we were cooking. Turns out that was where the other watch decided to sit, and they mistook the gas they had given us for theirs – there went the planned steak for dinner that night!

That night we tied up alongside the launch for the night and slept on the boat. It was a great way to sleep, even though 14 people in a 10-meter boat is a bit of a squeeze! Dinner was partially soaked 2-minute noodles (we were given hot water by the instructors) with raw veges and canned tuna. It was rather unappealing, and I wound up giving most of mine away. Thankfully the instructors followed this up with hot water for drinks so we could sleep.

Our last day was a wander back to Anakiwa, stopping off at Blumine Island along the way for a walk. The old battlements on there are really awesome and I would love to go back at some stage. We had the wind behind us the whole way home and managed to sail all the way in to the bay and almost all the way up to the wharf, dropping sails at the very latest safe point.



“There is no rest for the wicked” is the common saying. At Anakiwa it would more commonly be “there is no rest. Except on Solo”! We arrived back from sailing at about 4pm. By 9pm, we were back on the launch, headed for a point of land below the Queen Charlotte Track for our Solo experience. Setting up camp at about midnight (or at least, what felt like midnight. Watches were not allowed), it was a mission just to set up the tent fly and pull out the sleeping bag before collapsing in to bed. Sleep was the order of the day for almost the entirety of the three days we were there. We were confined to a small area close to our tent site and not meant to go away from it. Some of those who were closest to the water wound up heading to the beach, but I would have had to pass a half dozen tents to do this, which would have disturbed those people who I had to pass.



You are given a food allocation and a water allocation for solo. I consumed all the water (and had to be given more on day two), but came home with food, as I specifically decided to only eat when I was actually hungry. I think I was so tired that I just didn’t get hungry! I also managed to lose my voice almost entirely from not talking for three days, combined with the chesty cough I had had the entirety of the course thus far. Being collected on day three and taken to the launch which had fresh bread for sandwiches was great. Everyone in the watch commented that the solo seemed to have worked wonders for me, as I was glowing with what was best described as joy when we got back. I loved it, and keep meaning to do something similar again, but just don’t get around to it!

That evening we had to share with the rest of the group what we had done during solo, as we had been given specific tasks to complete. This took a really long time – it was well on 11pm before we were heading back to our bunkroom. On arrival at the bunkroom we were told that it was time for a briefing and to repack for tramping. Yikes!

At 6am the next morning we were all bundled in to the bus again, heading for the road behind Canvas Town, heading in to the Richmond Ranges for a three day tramp, taking only one of our two instructors. Almost the entirety of this tramp was off track, and up on ridges, camping under fly sheets. Thankfully though, this is a regular route and they have put a water tank in early on day two so you only need just over a days water at a time. First day was a LOT of climbing, and eventually we settled on a campsite and cooked tea, then did a short session of Yoga to stretch the muscles (one of the girls in the group is a part time yoga instructor).




Day two and the weather continued to be fair, if cold in the morning, and we had to make it up to a specific high point before dropping down a couple of technical ridges to the river to find our campsite for the night – an old helicopter landing pad, where we had permission to light a fire. We were so excited! Some of the navigation got a bit tricky, and time started to slip away on us (there is a rule that off-track tramping must STOP at dusk), but we were confident that we would just make time, even with the very sore limbs and blisters that were pestering party members and slowing our travel significantly.

All of a sudden there were screams from further back in the group. Someone had disturbed a wasp nest and was being stung quite viciously. Our stop point at that stage was three quarters of the way down a ridge, with a couple of very small clearings that we could put shelter in to, all on funny angles. Thankfully our party member with the most stings was just shocked, rather than allergic, so we set up camp, calmed her down and fed everyone.

The next morning we knew we had at least an extra hour of tramping to make up to get through our route for the day, so we were up and getting organized as soon as there was any light. Once it was light enough to see clearly, we were off down the hill. Our route that day involved finding a fork in a river as a main navigating point, and we managed to arrive at the river exactly on this point. After refilling water bottles it was off back UP the next hill, and we climbed solidly for over 3 hours until meeting the track to the top of Mt Royal. A late lunch was had on Mt Royals summit – it was a lovely day! – and we decided to go back to the road via the track instead of the longer option across another ridge and down the other side of the next valley.



This turned out to be an absolute blessing, because as it was we didn’t arrive at the road end until nearly 10pm, because so many of us were so sore that walking barely happened. The most challenging part for others was that we had eaten the absolute last of our food at about 4pm, which was only a small bag of scroggin anyway – every other ounce of food we had brought with us (and we had taken extra from the kitchens before departure) had been devoured at lunch time.

We were all intensely glad to see the bus at the road end when we finally got there, especially as our instructor had put a muffin on each seat for us, and then took us down the road for flush toilets and more water before heading back to Anakiwa for a very late (and very tasty!) dinner.
Finally heading to bed at nearly 1am, it was the shortest nights sleep, as the alarm went off at 4.30am for breakfast and run briefing so that we could start our half marathon at 7.30am. The route for the half was quite cool – half of it was on the road, and the other half on the Queen Charlotte Track to enable a finish at Anakiwa. My mood was buoyant, apart from the pain in my legs from the tramping, and this was aided by the singing in the bus I wound up in going around to the start.

Being a slow runner, I started off slowly but surely and near the back of the pack. At the back I stayed! I was second last through halfway (there was a limit to how long you could take to get there before they drove you back home) and dead last home. When I reached half-way, the fastest people were finishing. I only kept going because there was no other way home and my instructor was running with me. In the Anakiwa mind-set, when she caught up with me as tail end Charlie, my thoughts were not “that’s ok, she has to stay behind me” but rather “bugger, I have to keep ahead of her”.

Crossing the line in tears at 4hours 6minutes, I collapsed on the ground and took about 20 minutes to get myself together enough to walk to the showers. Lunch that day was sincerely welcomed, and it was all “treat” food, which was great, but almost too much after such a simple diet for three weeks!

The rest of the day was cleaning up, packing up and sleeping before a final night concert, an early night, no PT on the last morning and home. Finally!!!

Two and a half years later, I can now truly see the changes that completing Outward Bound has instilled in me. Each person changes perceptibly, but differently after the course. I gained a more positive outlook, and more of a belief that “Yes, I can do it”. I still get the winter blues, but they are no longer the debilitating blackness that they once were. I recommend Outward Bound to anyone who needs a challenge or wants to revitalize their life.

Yes, it was hellish while I was there, but it was also fantastic. Good friendships made, challenges met, the art of relaxing in very short time periods perfected. The best and worst three weeks of my life so far!

Tararua Snow

03 – 05 July 2009
Mark, Me, Barbara + 7 others
Holdsworth Road End, Tararua Forest Park

Mid-Winter, and I was scheduled to lead an Easy-Medium trip to Sunrise Hut to play in some snow. We were hoping for maybe half a meter, enough to make it a tramp IN snow, but not ploughing through tons of the stuff being miserable.



The weather snowed nicely for us the week before, so I contacted a campground in Dannevirke so we didn’t have to try and make it to the road end in snow in the dark before making our way to Triplex Hut in the snow and dark at midnight or later. They were happy to have us, and offered us a massive discount to boot.

Friday morning I arrived at work to a massive flurry of emails. The not-great weather I had been watching all week had hit the Ruahine’s hard. The leaders of the other trips were not thrilled with the idea of going in, with one having called the local DoC visitor centre that morning and receiving the advice that the CARPARK was under 1m of snow, with more expected over the weekend.

I cancelled our booking at the campground at Dannevirke. They were pleased to hear that news as they had been worried about our plans given the weather they were experiencing. I still met my punters at the railway station on Friday night at the standard time and we made plans to go a bit closer to home – so Powell Hut it was. Sad, as I had been there so.many.times before.

For some reason, we still decided to head over the hill that night rather than heading home and then regrouping early Saturday morning. This meant we had a cold night ahead of us, sleeping in the shelter at the Holdsworth Carpark, as the lodge was booked.

Thankfully the wind was in a good quarter, and we were joined in the shelter by a whole pack of scouts also off on a tramp, so the number of bodies squeezed in to the area with a roof kept us all a little warmer than we would otherwise have been.

Saturday morning dawned slightly overcast but dry, and so we headed off up the slightly muddy track. We came across our first snow patches somewhere above Mountain House. When we got to the last flat section just below the bushline, the snow was blanketing the ground entirely. Looking up the first steep scramble to the lowest point of the ridge, there was a LOT of snow ahead of us, but a good ground trail to follow our way up.

We all stopped to celebrate making it to the snow (and to don extra layers and sunglasses), as the weather started packing in a little. The snow was deep enough in places that our trail in the snow was walking on top of the stunted trees that grow on the ridge.

We made it to the hut with no drama, shook the snow off our boots and settled in to get warm. A scrummy dinner and dessert were had, books were read by candle light and we all settled in for one of the best nights sleep I’ve had at Powell as we had very little wind.

Sunday morning dawned overcast. No pretty sunrise for us. On went frozen boots and damp packs, and we inched our way back down the hill, out of the snow and back to town. We got to tramp to and in the snow, even if it wasn’t to our original destination, and we had a good time while we were at it.

Winning all around!

Frozen Water

Taranaki Falls Loop, Whakapapa Village

Winter Solstice Weekend, 19-21 June 2009

Team: Myself, Mark, Geoff, Andy H, Steijn, Rob, Several Others

The weather at the lodge was marginal, tending revolting. My group had originally intended to walk to Whakapapaiti Hut, cook up a brew for lunch, then wander on down to the village for a beer and hot chips before returning to the lodge. After a talk with Geoff K (Chief Guide), we decided to can that idea because it involved what would be a very cold river crossing about 3 hours from the road end.

Mark was keen to do Tama Lakes, but with the wind gusting as strong as it was, past experience suggested that lower Tama Lake would be as far as you would get, and even that wouldn’t be overly comfortable. Instead, we decided to do the Taranaki Falls loop – or as much of it as we could do, considering we had heard conflicting reports about whether it was open or not.

Knowing we had a maximum four-hour walk ahead of us, we all took our time, and took our cameras. We had a lot of fun testing the frozen streams to see how much weight they could hold (most that Mark tried easily held him), and how many large rocks we could bounce off them before they cracked (they often won that one – we gave up before we got a break).

All of a sudden, we were in a sheltered, sunny spot (but it was still not very warm) at the top of Taranaki Falls – which appeared to be frozen too! Awesome. This put paid to any remaining idea that walking on to Tama Lakes would be good – everyone was too keen to get down and wander around the frozen waterfall.



After some fun playing with the waterfall, we had a brief debate. There was a sign clearly stating that the track beyond the lower bridge was closed, and we were wondering whether this was more to keep out underprepared daywalkers, or if there was something seriously wrong with the track. We decided that we would climb the fence and continue down the track anyway, being prepared to turn around at any point where it became obvious why the track was closed, and we felt unsafe continuing on.

Turns out, the track was closed for maintenance around an old slip, which we easily navigated. Our biggest difficulty actually lay in getting past some of the machinery that was on the track to do this work!
Before too long we were walking back out of the valley, taking the long, slow march from the forest edge to the van, parked in the carpark, soaking up the sunshine for us. We had all bought our swimming gear, and had always planned to head off to Tokaanu for a soak in the hotpools, but some people felt they really hadn’t done enough walking to earn it yet – so we stopped off on the way at Lake Rotoponamu.

The loop walk around the lake takes about an hour. Some of us didn’t really feel like walking all the way around, so we walked down to the lake and back up while the others ran around the lake. We had some exceedingly interesting conversations while we waited for the runners to get back to us… Poor Mark was the only bloke that didn’t run.

The hot pools were divine as always, and we stayed longer than we really should have. By the time we were coming back to the side of Mt Ruapehu, the sun was setting on the mountain, lighting it beautifully. The problem with this was that by the time we got back up to the carpark, it was dark and we had no headtorches! Oops! Thankfully Serac Lodge had its light on over the path, but the shadows were still huge.



After that it was party time – a yummy dinner, an 80’s themed dress-up party and a good quantity of alcohol meant pretty much everyone just chilled on Sunday morning. Once a good sized group were up and about, someone decided we should take the lodge toboggans down to the snow in Happy Valley and have a play on the snow. It was great – till I came off awkwardly and gave myself whiplash! Oops. Thank goodness Mark and I were travelling back in Robs car rather than the club van, as that was way more comfortable for the drive home. Needless to say, I wrote off the rest of the season for possible snowboarding lessons (on the advice of my Osteopath), which I wasn’t really complaining too much about!

Paua Hut

May 2-3 2009

Orongorongo Valley, Rimutaka Forest Park

Team: Sue (Leader), Ravi, Lillian, Amelia, Mark, Mike, Angela, Toby, Stacey, Bronwyn
Weekends like this are why I love tramping!

Friday night some of my workmates and I headed out for dinner at the Flying Buritto Brothers to celebrate surviving the dramas of the end of the financial year (and the seeing off of the auditors!). Even the CEO joined our small group for the evening, which was actually quite fun! Mark and I then headed home to pack for our tramp that was leaving on Saturday morning, and I have to say that my pack seemed MUCH smaller simply for not having to spend a night at the road end - not that I could think of much that I would normally take but didnt, although, I did forget hut shoes entirely, which is really kinda stupid when you consider that I KNEW we had to cross a river multiple times to get to the hut!


The track in to Paua Hut is a fairly simple amble. Well, it would normally be if I hadnt had too much marguerita the night before! It starts with a bit of a climb up the hil, then wambles up and down for what took us about 2.5 hours before reaching the river. We had Toby, a 6 year old, with us, which meant more frequent stops for all, and a slower pace than normal as well!
Before too long we reached the end of the track, where it drops rather steeply down to the river, and a really funky bridge...


From here it was time to start a half-hour or so amble along, across and through the river to the hut.

For the first couple of crossings, we practiced "good technique" even though the river was well down (given the heavy rain of the previous few days, this was a relief!), just so we could say we had. From then on though, it was every person for themselves, and we had quite a lot of fun in the river!
All of a sudden, we were at the hut and it was lunch time!! Mark, Stacey and I had arranged between us to carry some treat food for the afternoon, so we spent our time nibbling on crackers and cheese, and corn chips with salsa dip. This was a big plus, as the dinner was rather plain and dull to be honest - Mac n cheese with bacon, followed by choc instant pud with marshmallows... Edible, but given the easiness of the trip, I would have expected something a little more... extravagant... perhaps. The other groups Thai Green Curry Tuna actually looked rather appealing compared to ours!!
After an afternoon sitting in whatever sun we could find, reading books, still we all headed to bed for a reasonably early night - because we could!! I slept in as late as I could get away with in the morning, and when I got up, found that most of the hut were up and about and outside, reading or generally relaxing before breakfast!
The walk home was more of the same, only the other way around, and we ended up back at the road end at the same time as the medium group, who had taken a much more challenging route to get there!

In the Summertime

Abel Tasman Coastal Track, Abel Tasman National Park
24 - 28 January 2007
People: Amelia, Emma, Emily, Olivia, Marion, Tiffany, Kathryn, Lizzy, Dani, Sam, Chrystal

Now, its been well over two years since I did this track, but I had completed the same walk at least twice before the trip I write of here, so at least the track itself is easy to remember!

We started in Wellington, staying overnight at the guide hall to make sure everyone had everything and that all the food was sorted in such a way as to keep it safe until needed. Dropped at the ferry terminal at 7.30am, we had a nice, relaxing start to our week. Chrystal met us in Picton, having been in the South Island on holiday for the previous week, and we boarded our bus bound for Nelson, then onward to Kaiteriteri beach for the night.

We had a quick swim at Kaiteriteri in the afternoon, before having ice creams from the shop and cooking dinner on our little gas cookers at our tent site with our little tents... We felt a bit insignificant when we compared our little site with the massive behemoth tents that surrounded us... Emaa, Olivia and I shared a tent fly to save weight and it was lovely to have that light breeze coming through the tent at night.

In the morning we started lazily. Safe Crossing time at Awarua wasnt until 7pm, and it was only an hours water taxi and two hours walk to get there. We were booked on a Noon taxi, which meant sitting out at the beach in the heat with all our gear for a couple of hours after we cleared our campsite. the shuttle ran to time at least, and while out we got to see some seals.

Working on the theory that it shouldnt get full dark until about 9.30pm and it was only meant to be an hour and a bit from Awarua to Onetahuti, we had planned to walk through to that campsite in the late evening in order to make day two slightly shorter. This meant we needed to have had dinner, cleaned up and repacked by 7pm, ready to start crossing. Now, the thing with the Awaroa Inlet is that "safe crossing time" extends quite a way each side of low tide (about 2 hours), and if you go at the very start or very end, the water gets quite deep...

(This isnt the deepest it got of course. The girls all wound up having to hold their packs funny in order to avoid getting them wet too)
Deep water means slow movement, and looking back I think it would have been better to wait for actual low tide before crossing and then stay at the Awarua campsite, especially as it got well dark before we managed to get to the campsite and one of the groups nearly got lost! Crossing the small Onetahuti inlet (which never really gets more than waist deep anyway) would definitely be much easier in daylight than in the torch light we wound up crossing it under!

Having read the weather report posted at the Totaranui campsite that we started out from, our smaller group decided to get up early the next morning to hopefully get in some good tramping before it got too hot. This plan failed epically when Emma started showing signs of heat exhaustion only about an hour and a half into the anticipated 7 hours to complete that day. We managed to get Emma very slowly to Bark Bay Hut, where water taxis come in for pick up / drop off and then sat and waited for the other group to turn up. We worked hard at relaxing, cooling and rehydrating Emma, and by the time the rest arrived, she was feeling much better, but still not up to tramping the next 4 hours to our overnight campsite (which was also about the next place we could expect to pick up a water taxi for her!).

So Emma and myself were accompanied by all the group tents and Dani's pack on to Anchorage by water taxi while the rest of the group walked through to Torrent Bay. When they got there it was starting to rain. They helped a guy pack up his tent, and in return got a ride across that estuary rather than having to walk the tidal track around it. In the mean time we had pitched all the tents bar one (someone had forgotten to give us part of it), had a swim and had a nap while a thunderstorm raged above us. Dinner was cooked in the small shelter provided and included fresh soup and bread.

Instead of walking out from Anchorage, we had arranged Sea Kayaks to take us out.

It was a great day, although we all had wicked motion sickness when we got back to Nelson for the night - I clearly remember standing in the shower at Tahunanui Beach Campsite, holding on to the walls so I didnt fall over when I closed my eyes (and can I just say, the showers at that campsite were fantasitc!!). Most of us got at least partly sunburnt that day, and after fish n chips from the camp store for dinner, we all went to bed fairly early, with most people deciding to sleep out of their tents since the weather was so mild.

After all that, the only thing left to do was to catch a taxi, bus and ferry home to Wellington. I think most of us slept most of the way!!
If I was to do this again, I think I would go to Marahau for the night before instead of Kaiteriteri, as then you would have the option of leaving travel stuff at the campground while on track and collecting it on the way out. I have only ever walked the track Totaranui - Marahau, and I think I prefer doing it that way, especially with the days kayaking to finish!

(Almost) Four Seasons in three days

Kepler Track, Fiordland National Park
29 - 31 December 2008
Amelia and Mark

Monday
Man I hate Monday mornings. Even more so when you are meant to be on holiday and still have to get up early. This morning was made even harder by the fact that two days previous I had managed to get VERY sunburnt at Mt Cook, and it had been VERY warm overnight in our room at the Holiday Park in Te Anau, where it had stayed light until well after we were in bed and asleep.
After a quick breakfast and re-pack of the car, we were off to Safer Parking (its home for the next three days) to wait for our shuttle to collect us. Sure, we could have walked the 45-odd minutes around the lakefront to the control gates to start the track, but we figured the cost to get a ride was small enough to spare and save us some time!

Pick up was at some ungodly hour (about 8.30am), so we had to be all set, with the car parked before then. We made it with a couple of minutes to spare, and were at the control gates, ready to start the track at about 9am. It was sunny, warm and a lovely day to be enjoying the shade of the bush when carrying three days worth of stuff, plus emergency gear! (our food was a substantial portion of this weight it turned out!). The weather was not meant to stay nice for all three days though, so we enjoyed it while it lasted!

The first hour or so was a gentle wander on a track nice and wide enough for us to walk alongside each other. We got to Brod Bay in good time, and paused here for a nibble and drink before racing off again to escape the resident sandfly population (Note: NEVER camp there!!), deciding to have lunch well up the hill. We targetted getting to the Limestone Bluffs that are mentioned in the guide book, and when we got to 1pm and still hadnt reached them, we gave up and had lunch where we were. Needless to say, we found them about 20 mins further up the track, and stopped for a second lunch stop at a nice seating area alongside them with an Australian Family.



Eventually we arrived at Luxmore Hut and found ourselves beds in the smaller bunkroom. I have to say that for a huge hut, it has a tiny, and poorly planned out, communual area. The kitchen is cramped, and to ensure they have seating for most people, there is a dining table in the middle of it! I guess they hoped that it would only be full in good weather when it was built, which would allow most people to sit outside. It does have quite a cool inside-outside feel to it though. "Cool" being the operative word - from the warm bunkrooms and kitchen, through the COLD hallway and toilet area... At least the loos are flush ones during the summer season!

Dinner was sweet and sour pork with pasta (since we were having pasta again the next night it saved also buying rice). Full of fresh veges and with fresh meat. Had a funny moment when I came out of the bunkroom with our dinner stuff laden in my arms, to see someone coming out of the other bunkroom with theirs - one pot and a packet of Rice Risotto. Would rather our dinner over theirs any day. In fact, I think we had the best dinner in the hut that night, and I have to say that the extra weight to carry it (and the bottle of wine to share over two nights) was SO worth it when we saw what others were eating... Lots of unhappy faces over the dehy there!

The smaller bunkroom has massive picture windows, which would be nice if it werent for the fact that daylight hours extend out to nearly midnight at that time of year down there! The photo below is of the view from the deck outside the bunkroom as we went to bed about 9.30pm... I wound up using a bandanner as a blindfold to get to sleep, while Mark hid himself deep into his sleeping bag (I would have been FAR too hot if I had too!)


Tuesday
We decided not to rush out the door for day two, as the weather was meant to stay reasonably fair all day, and only rain later in the afternoon. It was straight up hill to start with, and the wind was quite gusty at times (even though it was less windy than both the day before and the day after). We had both started the morning with walking poles, which soon got put back on the sides of our packs because they were getting blown around something wicked! Most depressing on this day were the bits of track where you could see what looked to be about the next two hours of track ahead of you - and there were lots of these bits!

We got to the turn-off to Mt Luxmore summit and decided that since we were here we should really go up to the top proper. The wind at the turn-off was freezing, so we rugged up in layers of warm clothes. Mark headed off like a mountain goat while I struggled up with sore Achilles tendons from the day before. I made it eventually, and was glad that I had when I saw the view from the top. We got one of the guys there to take a photo of the two of us and then headed back down to the main track.

From there it was a quick slog to the Forest Burn Shelter for lunch. The last bit down to the shelter is a steep and nasty zig zag, but the shelter has a toilet and on a nice day has a good deck to sit on and a picnic table. From there to Hanging Valley Shelter should take about 2 hours, but we were there in less than one.


We were going to take a longer break at Hanging Valley before attacking the downhill section of the track, but the spits of rain we started to feel put us off that idea, so off we went! The downhill from Hidden Valley Shelter to Iris Burn Hut has to be one of my most miserable memories from the entire trip, as after about 1.5 hours of straight downhill I was in considerable pain in both knees and could barely walk by the time we got to the hut. What was meant to take about 2 hours wound up taking us nearly 4 at my final pace. I do have to admit to being intensely grateful for my walking poles in this section though, as my knees would have gone sooner if it wasnt for them!

Iris Burn Hut has three bunkrooms. One massive one, with lots of dark hidey holes (great if you want to sleep in I guess), one tiny one with just four beds, which I suspect used to be the rangers room, and a large airy one with about 20 bunks upstairs. Yes. Upstairs. Guess which bunkroom we ended up in?? Can I just say how glad I was that I didnt need to get up and go the toilet in the middle of the night?? The only problem with the upstairs bunkroom is that the only windows directly above the platform bunks, which also have a low, sloping roof above them. At least the bunks werent full, so I could spread out a little and not have to kick a rafter all night!
Dinner was pasta and veges with pesto sauce and got some very envous glances from the dehy-dinner brigade, especially when we pulled out fudge for dessert!

Wednesday
Tramping out was wet. The aim for most of the day was simply to keep moving, and this was about all I managed to do. There are some very cool parts to the track through here, and it is mostly flat for the entire day. We saw a kea alongside the river at one point, but my camera wouldnt zoom in close enough to get a good photo, plus the light was dim, so it wanted to take a longer exposure, making for a blurry picture. Damn having no dSLR!!

We stopped for lunch at Moturau Hut, where the warden had a nice fire going. For lunch we had planned to have sandwiches of some description, but being so wet, we decided to cook up some of our emergency food (chicken soup), and some of our leftover food (pasta) for lunch. It wound up being remarkably good, and we decided that adding some salami would make it a great super lightweight dinner on a future tramp.

We then missioned out to Rainbow Reach for an earlier shuttle to get us back to civilisation and hot showers. We had booked for 5pm, and if the weather had been nice, even with the pain in my knees, we probably would have taken more time and used that shuttle. Instead we made it out for a 3pm ride out with the same company. In fact, we arrived at the road end in good enough time to wait for 15 minutes for the shuttle... I contemplated changing into dry clothes, but my raincoat was soaked through and the rain was still pretty torrential, so I thought I would leave that for our accommodation.

We were returned to our car at Safer Parking, and Mark drove us around town looking for a place to stay. We abandoned our booked tent site in favour of a motel with a bed and private bathroom, (it was one of the only places we could see that had a vacancy sign!) meaning we could both get out of wet stuff straight away, rather than having to find and pitch a tent in the rain (it was also useful that the motel had towels, as ours were now wet from having been sat on for the journey from Safer Parking to the motel!). Having hot showers in our room and sleeping on a bed rather than an air mattress was great too, as was having ample room to put wet stuff and dry stuff without having to worry about whether they were going to get more wet from the rain!

Getting in and out of chairs and off the bed was a substantial problem for me all night (and to a lesser extent for the next couple of days), and I was so exhausted that I napped for about an hour before dinner (we took the car a whole 1km to the Moose for it. That place is still as good as I remember!), and then again from about 9pm, to be woken by and tap on the shoulder and "Happy New Years" from Mark at midnight (so much for the "we'll sit in the motel and have a couple of beers while we wait for the new year" plan from dinner time, and the "Te Anau goes off for New Years, so lets party till the small hours" plan from before we left home!).

The rain stopped briefly at midnight, so there were fireworks, which were nice. We watched them in our PJ's from the door of our motel unit. Would have been great to have had the energy to be out on the waterfront - bet there would have been some cool shots to get. They would have had a neat view from the ridge just east of Luxmore Hut too. Might have to remember that for another year...

The Ruahines Do It Better

Sunrise Hut,
20-22 March 2009
Punters: Amelia (Leader), Mark, Chris, Jodi, Jordan, Brad, Jo, Karl, Megan, Lisa, Chad, Ian
Friday arrived with a promise of good weather for most of the weekend – only a vague possibility of rain on Sunday afternoon darkening the horizon. Friday lied as it turned out, but we can forgive that as this was only a small blip on the radar of an otherwise fantastic trip.

Missioning our way north, with the group split between two vans to make maximum use of available space, we arrived in Levin for dinner at 7pm. Traffic had been astoundingly good to us! Most of us headed for fish’n’chips from the Chinese place across from KFC, and then proceeded to sit on the picnic tables on KFC’s front lawn to eat. Not bad food at a darn good price with substantial portions seemed to be the general consensus. Through the back roads to avoid Palmerston North, we whizzed past the club van in Woodville, only to be overtaken again when we had stopped for ice-creams in Dannevirke.

Eventually arriving at the road end, we somehow had managed to arrive last, which was ok apart from the fact it meant that the hut was full with everyone else before we got there, and somewhere just out of Dannevirke it had started RAINING (remember I told you that Friday lied? Well, that was its biggest one). Of course, this did lead to a vague concern as to what the weather would do for the rest of the weekend, as well as how some easy trampers would cope with sleeping under a tent fly for the first time given the conditions. In the end there was no real need to worry. We spread out everywhere – some on the floor in the kitchen, some on the floor in the bunkrooms (one enterprising group member managed to be in the right place at the right time to get an offer of an ACTUAL bunk!!), two in the woodshed and the rest happily cocooned under the very middle of the two flys we had put up.

We needn’t have worried about the weather either, as the rain stopped quite early in the night (early being the operative word, given we didn’t arrive and get to bed till nearly 1am!). Saturday morning dawned with massive clear blue skies and the promise of quite a bit of warmth to come. We hung about the hut for a while, letting the tents dry as much as possible before packing them, and eventually headed off up the hill about 9.30am.



The pace was slow to the point of being snail-like at times, but this also provided some great opportunities for conversation, and the rare chance to see a Morepork perched in a tree, sleepily watching us watch it.



Morning tea was had at the track junction, where a large seat makes for a fantastic rest spot. Chocolate duly came out of packs and was shared around, with Chris reminding Jodi that the chocolate she was sharing was half his (her reply was that that was the half she was sharing out!). Continuing up the hill with anticipations of lunch in the sunshine, we came across a whole series of cool signs that Norsewear had erected with information about the flora and fauna of the area, as well as some of its history. Very neat, and rather useful “pause” stops!

Before too long we had arrived at the top of the hill and the hut. Its fantastic how the hut really hides from you until you are basically right on top of it – no teasing sightings from a distance making you think it might be closer than it is! With a generous deck area and multiple entranceways, this hut would be a welcome haven in bad weather from any direction.

Packs and boots came off, bunks were chosen, a brew went on and lunches came out. The tent flies were ingeniously attached to the deck of the hut to continue drying.



Some members of the group headed off towards where Craigs group were spending the night and got about an hour along the track before deciding to come back. The rest of us made do with exploring the area immediately around the hut, including the short scramble behind the hut to an awesome vista of the inner ranges. Eventually someone decided it was afternoon tea, and Chris and Jodi pulled out crackers with nice cheese and dip to eat them with. Needless to say, they are welcome on any easy trip any of us take again in the future.

It was, however, starting to cloud over a little, and get somewhat cold. Having said goodbye to John, who had driven in to join us for a daywalk, we moved inside and pulled out a couple of decks of cards to play last card. Fresh camp cooked bread was produced (and devoured) as a precursor to dinner, which was prepared and demolished in pretty quick succession (for the record, it was Sweet & Sour Pork on Rice). Having cooked, I managed to avoid doing dishes (Bonus!), and so instead got a half hour reprieve before starting to prepare dessert. People were still quite full from dinner, so the chocolate “self-caking sauce” (cheers Chris) that we didn’t manage to consume was wrapped back up in anticipation of possibly being someones breakfast in the morning (it duly was).

Stargazers went for a wander outside before bed, and were rewarded with one of THE most stunning views of the Southern Cross and Milky Way I have ever seen. There were no clouds anywhere to ruin the view (at least to begin with) and it was simply awe-inspiring.

Bed ensued not long after, and I think a lot of people fell asleep very quickly and very deeply after what had probably been an average to poor Friday nights sleep. It rained overnight (quite heavily some have reported), but cleared beautifully for everyone to get up at 6.15 to watch the developing sunrise. Most people went back to bed as the sun came fully up for another couple of hours sleep. It was great and a very nice treat.







Once we all finally started getting up and organized, there wasn’t a lot of time wasted. Making our way down the hill at our own pace, with nice long stops for the back markers to catch up, we were still back at Triplex Hut for lunch at noon. After a break in the sunshine eating as much as possible of what was left of our food, it was back to the van so we didn’t miss other groups to steal spare spaces in their vans, and after a bit of a wait, we all headed home. Our van seemed to be on a sugar high, as we made a decent attempt at eating all of Karl’s lollies (which he had cunningly hidden until after dessert on Saturday night), and played multiple rounds of twenty questions (“Am I bigger than the van?” “Did we see one this weekend?”) before arriving back in Wellington and going our own ways again. All in all, not a bad trip, and much better weather than the last one I went on (into the Tararuas!)

EIGHT GET WET

(AKA: TOTARA FLATS THAT WASN’T)

Powell Hut, Tararua Forest ParkDate: 27 February – 1 March 2009
People: Amelia (Leader), Joel, Lilian, Anna, Victoria, Mark, Barbara, Deborah.

Friday night at the railway station there were some concerned faces (in the other group at least) during discussion of the weather report for the weekend – wet, windy and generally not very nice. Being hardy souls, we all decided that the weather report had changed so many times in the last 8 hours that it was pretty much irrelevant, so we piled into the GUTLESS WONDER (aka the diesel, automatic, rental van) and headed off to the Wairarapa.

Arriving in Carterton at a respectable 7pm (having left Wellington ON TIME for once), an announcement was made that good kebabs were here, fish n chips down the road, each to their own, see you in about half an hour… Half an hour later we had barely managed to all order at Istanbul, and by the time we had all eaten and were looking at heading off, it was nearly 8. Sent Victoria and Mark off to find Joel who was watching the cricket at the pub and got back on the road.

But it was OK, since it was only a short drive on to the road end, and after running in to the caretaker who informed us that it actually costs money to sleep at the Holdsworth road end, some people headed off to Donnelly flat and others camped out in the shelter at the road end anyway, deciding that staying dry in the morning was more important. It wasn’t a bad choice, as it started raining at about 6.15am and it was lovely to continue lying in bed, listening to the rain, knowing that there were flush toilets just there, and we didn’t have to get wet getting organized to go.

Pulling out the map as we worked through breakfast, a discussion was held on likely issues on our intended route – including unbridged streams and the fact that if the weather cleared (which was looking more unlikely) there wasn’t anything to go look at from Totara Flats. So we decided to head up the hill to Powell for the night instead, hoping for the weather to clear to allow us a short stroll up to the trig. Talking to another group at the lodge, we found that it was probably the right decision, as one of their group had gone in to Totara Flats in bad weather and been stuck at the hut because of uncrossable streams in the past.

So up the hill we trudged, into ever worsening weather. The wind was blowing DIRECTLY in the door of Mountain House, meaning it really provided no shelter at all. So, we had a really quick stop for food and water and got moving again. Up towards Powell it got challenging at times with the wind trying to blow us all off the hill, and the clouds making sure we couldn’t see where we would fall if we did. Eventually the hut appeared in front of us, lashed by rain and the verandah offering no shelter for taking off wet gear, so all the wet gear went inside instead, where it dripped into huge puddles in the doorway.

Thankfully the old gas heater that had been broken on my last overnight visit to Powell had been replaced by a coal fire and plenty of coal to burn, so once we were all in dry clothes, it was time to get the fire lit and a billy of water on for hot drinks to go with lunch. We were all still vaguely hopeful that the weather would improve – mainly so we didn’t have to go down to the toilets in wet gear and nasty weather – but it steadfastly refused to get any better, so we were confined to the hut all afternoon. Naps and reading ensued before dinner at a reasonable time and dessert as the light faded. At some stage a report came in that the door had half come off one toilet, meaning there was only ONE toilet available - which caused a couple of short queues during the evening of people waiting inside for the person ahead to come back. Everyone wandered off to bed, only to be woken at about 2am by a member of another party loudly complaining about the members of a third playing with the fire and quietly talking. None of us had heard any of the noise though, so we don’t know what she was going on about!

Sunday morning was a lazy affair for everyone in the hut. The larger other group had originally planned to head over to Jumbo, but the weather had changed that plan on Saturday, when the plan had been changed to East Holdsworth if the weather cleared, which it didn’t. The couple who had still (apparently) been up at 2am had consumed rather a large amount of wine, and were still only just stirring from their bunks at about 8.30. We had a relaxed breakfast, pack up and clean up and headed out of the hut about 9.30am. With only about three hours walking ahead, followed by lunch in Carterton, we were in no hurry. Most of us had put back on at least some wet gear from Saturday before leaving, so the cold wind and slow pace down hill was a tad miserable. Once we got to Mountain House (out of the wind and into improving weather) we all went at our own pace, stopping a couple of times along the way to make sure everyone was still there. The further down the hill we got the warmer it was, and the less clothes people coming in the opposite direction were wearing. We started to feel a bit silly and overdressed!

Back to the van, changed into dry clothes and off to Carterton for yummy lunch and a beer at the White Swan, collecting an extra from the other group along the way, follwed by a stop at Schoc chocolates before leaving town and we were back in what was actually quite a sunny, warm Wellington (well, comparably) early enough to get the van back to the rental company before it closed!