Day 35 - Paddle Hill Creek to Double Hut, 23.2km, 5 hours 45 minutes

Maori Lakes, close to the Ashburton/Hakatere River.  A beautiful area.

The good news is that walking in sandals was no issue for my badly mangled heels, albeit today was largely easy terrain with just a small ridge to climb over.

The day started out by dropping into a large basin surrounded by mountains, rather reminiscent of the Hanmer Basin, whereupon the 700km milestone was soon crossed.


Crossing the Ashburton River we then came to a quite lovely section close to Lake Heron called the Maori Lakes, providing stunning views into the large mountains and remnant glaciers of the Arrowsmith range.

We had a few more kilometres of road walking to negotiate, with any luck the last for some time (Rakaia River south bank not withstanding - it's currently blocked from cyclone damage).

This led back into the hills and a late lunch at Manuka Hut, a great spot.

We weren't staying though, we had a lazy 5km to negotiate to Double Hut, which has spectacular views down to Lake Heron.


One final note of interest. I had heard rumours of Ed Hillary's scrawl in Double Hut. I found it, and it is old, but it looks fake to me. Amongst other things, Hillary is usually spelled with 2 l's. I'll let you decide for yourself.


Tomorrow we get into some more difficult terrain. I've decided to attempt it in sandals, and only switch back to boots as a last resort despite Neil finding me some left behind inner soles in the hut here that will do a job quite nicely if required.

Day 34 - Rangitata River to Paddle Hill Creek, 18.5km, 5 hours

Climbing north, away from the Rangitata River.

Starting in Rangiora, we first had a drive back to the trailhead on the north bank of the Rangitata River.

Mt Sunday is close to the trailhead, famous as Edoras in the Lord of the Rings films. I was keen for a look and so was Neil so we diverted for an hour or two to join the thronging masses. I'm fairly sure this must be the most climbed mountain in New Zealand. Actually it's interesting that it's called a mountain, it's only 80 meters above the river plain.

Then it was lunch at the trailhead, bye to mum and dad, who'd very graciously come along to take the car home, and setting off on the actual trail at 1pm.

While in town I'd replace my boot inner soles, which were starting to get into a sorry state. Unfortunately the new ones were a complete disaster. They lifted my heels enough that my boots would wear at the heel on both feet like sandpaper whilst climbing. Within 20 minutes of walking I had an issue, taping didn't help and when I stopped to remove the inner soles after 40 minutes both heels had literally been cut open, creating by far the worst blisters I have had so far on trail. I walked the rest of the day with no inners and double socks. This was better, but the damage had already been done and any climbing was agony. I'll take to my sandals tomorrow, but there is some difficult climbing the day after which will be interesting.


Getting back to the walking, early on we passed Lake Clearwater, the holiday homes there looking somewhat like a squatters camp, which I presume they largely are.


Climbing up onto a high plain we then traversed along for awhile before finding a stream, albeit choked with matagouri and difficult to access, but nevertheless a decent tenting spot for the night.

The section through to the Rakaia River is only 3 days, so I have brought in fresh food and beer, ala a 'normal' tramp.
I haven't had too many spectacular sunsets this trip but was favoured with one this evening.

Hiatus 5 - Home for 3 days

Not getting across the Rangitata had the advantage in providing the opportunity to go home for a bit of much needed R&R&R (rest, relaxation and resupply).
I have a couple of home breaks lined up while I'm in Canterbury. It's great to be back home with my family, and I have to say that I've been really enjoying my comforts, notably food!

Neil has been staying too. No doubt it has been interesting for Neil to put a face to a name since I talk about Karen a fair bit on track, and also vice versa, since I've been mentioning Neil a fair bit in the blog. It's been great having Neil along - while enjoying being home, it's good to be able to chew the fat about the track as well.

I'm determined to finish the track but have been going long enough that I'm really starting to feel the pull of home, so it'll be good to get back on track tomorrow to remind myself about the other part of my life right now - the walking, as opposed to eating, part!

Day 33 - Crooked Spur Hut to Rangitata River, 8km, 3 hours

Today was dominated by the decision whether or not to ford the Rangitata River. After a fair bit of consultation home to see what the river and weather was doing I decided I didn't like the forecast of rain in the mountains, together with the news that the river level had started to rise during the night.  Arrangements were duly put in place for Karen to play taxi and pick us up. One ruined Saturday for her, she's an angel! However it left us with a really easy few kilometres dropping down to Bush Stream, then down to the river.

This meant a fair few crossings of Bush Stream, which was quite high, up to about bum level in places. The first crossing didn't go so well for me; I ended up grovelling around on hands and knees with water up to my chin, but the rest of the crossings were much better.

Within 3 hours we were at the car park, then 45 minutes spent having a dip in the stream and some lunch saw Karen turn up and a trip home to Rangiora for a few days.

Day 32 - Royal Hut to Crooked Spur Hut, 15km, 5 hours 30 minutes

Having spent a day and a half in Royal Hut I was on the point of leaving, with pack donned, when I discovered the back of the door of the hut. A treasure trove!  It was littered with the names of parties involved in autumnal droving runs, who obviously based themselves out of this hut, and included some proper New Zealand royalty.

One name was particularly noteworthy. 
Harry Ayers is without doubt the most famous mountain guide in New Zealand's history, bar none. Today he is best known as the man who guided/taught Sir Ed to climb throughout the Southern Alps, but this is to only brush the surface of his accomplishments. A genuinely exciting discovery to see his name up on the door, and on VE day no less!

The door had other famous names in New Zealand mountaineering, including Gottlieb Brawn-Elwert, who died while guiding then Prime Minister Helen Clark close to this hut (actually just the other side of Stag Saddle, where we had just come from).

Back to more prosaic matters. I'm going to have to start varying my diet soon. The unchanging texture of dehydrated food is starting to do my head in.

We're still in pretty big country, however with a fairly short day and not an undue amount of climbing, just a lot of up and down I expected an easy day, especially after coming off a zero day.



I was surprised therefore to find the day tough going. My legs had plenty in the tank but cardio-wise I just couldn't get in the zone today. I've been struggling with meals a little, but have been making sure to get through most of my food. 
Nevertheless I wouldn't be surprised if that has something to do with it.

In any case we had a decent break at Stone Hut on the way past before pushing on reaching a saddle with fantastic views after a short but testing climb up a scree slope...

... it was then an easy few kilometres to our hut for the night, itself having fantastic views to the Rangitata River.

Tomorrow will be interesting. All the SOBOs we have passed in the last few days have promised hell and brimstone on the few kilometres down Bush Stream to the river, with tales of unfordable maelstroms abounding. Most New Zealanders we have passed have been more optimistic, so I'm expecting some excitement but no particular issues getting to the Rangitata.

Crossing the Rangitata, which I have been hopeful of doing, might be a different story. It is still significantly higher than it normally is this time of year, as a result of the recent cyclone. We did talk to one SOBO who crossed it today, but it was flowing swiftly at belly button height for him. With rain forecast for the mountains that's marginal to say the least. I promised Karen before starting that I wouldn't be fording anything deeper than waist deep. Crossing with Neil would make the crossing easier though, so we'll see how the chips fall in the morning.

Day 31 - Royal Hut, 0km

A zero day, the first since Southland. All my other rest days since have been on hiatuses (hiatii?) in towns.

A day to dry out the tent/boots/clothes, sunbath, dip in the river, read and eat. Bliss!

Day 30 - Roundhill Ski Area to Royal Hut, 24km, 7 hours 30 minutes

Tenting out last night I was hoping to wait for the next hut 8km away for my ablutions but, when nature calls...
Fortunately there was a rabbit hole ideally placed. No digging required on my part, but no doubt one very shocked rabbit. Never mind, quid pro quo for all the rabbit droppings I've been walking over for the last 4 days.

The walking day started with an easy 5km of picturesque trail...


... before dropping to the Coal River and some fairly slow route finding upstream and an impromptu swim by Neil.


Within 90 minutes we'd made it to Camp Stream Hut, a fantastic little private hut with a large stack of fire wood that would make for a brilliant little weekend destination in from the Roundhill road end. We were only staying for lunch, but the $10 cost of staying there would have been well worth it.


After lunch, like most TA walkers, we left the official trail which followed a valley, instead climbing onto a sublime ridge with magnificent 360 degree views. Only a matter of 20km to the northwest was Aoraki, the other mountains bordering the Grand Plateau and the main divide. Unfortunately on our day this was largely hidden in cloud, but such was the scenery that this hardly detracted from the grandeur of the scene, with 2500+ meter high mountains dotting the landscape at seemingly all angles.

The ridge was some of the easiest climbing on the trail so far, a really easy gradient and took us across the 650km mark on the trail. HALF WAY!!! So momentous that it called for an inter centenary thumbs up.

As always the views kept improving as we climbed. The high point on the whole trail is Stag Saddle at 1950 meters. It seemed a shame to top out just below 2000, and with the newly named Beuzenberg  Peak (named after a Mt Cook guided, deceased on a fall with 2 clients) easily climbable from the ridge at 2070 meters we carried on up. Feeling privileged to stand in such a place I started to reel off photos, none of which really capture the majesty of the place.







Then it was down a long scree slope on the other side of the mountain. We had 700 meters of altitude to lose, and only 4km to the hut to do it in.


The day was bookended by another hour and a half of difficult river route finding. I was getting tired and this section seemed to go on forever.

But we eventually made it to Royal Hut, so named because Prince Charles and Princess Anne were once choppered in here for tea. I think I earned it more!