Wednesday 5^th. March.

 

Another cold blue sky morning. Today going up the Eastern section of the Routeburn Track. Going to be the biggest walk yet, so pack double rations and 2 ½ litres of water. 

Drive the 20km. some over gravel road to the Routeburn Shelter, the start of the Routeburn Track from the Eastern side.

Fleece on I start the walk with Carl an American living in Christchurch – retired US Navy - joined the Navy because his father was US Airforce and Carl didn’t like the flat plains of Wyoming – took his photo for him because he was off on a more remote track and unlikely to see anyone for a 3 days or so. 

With an amazing spring in my step (I am getting back to something like my old self) I follow the Grey Gravel Track for a couple of hours through the extensive beautiful Beech Forest. These NZ Beeches are very different from our own. Red Beech to start at the lower levels, which has dark red-brown shaggy corrugated bark and leaves only the size of a thumb nail, and then Silver Beech further up, which has even smaller tiny glossy dark green leaves. The ground to the side of the track is rocky and steep, and covered with moss and lots of young Beech from shrub to sapling.

 

As I started early, I saw few people initially, but then you meet 20 or so mainly Americans, although guided, spread out coming down from the second Lodge, this being their 3^rd. and final day; but then I am overtaken by 3 American lads doing the whole route in a day, and then a local runner doing it in a few hours. From the way I have been going I know I could do the whole 32 km. track in a day, but then I would have the problem of the 350 km. road trip back to the start. There are ways and means of doing this, but too complicated for me to organize without more local knowledge.

3 swing bridges over very large gorges, alongside the Routeburn itself, a large stream gurgling its way down amongst massive boulders, with 300 metre vertical cliffs above in places, and views from between the trees of a variety of mountains around from Scottish to Sub Alpine to Alpine.

 

 

 

You come to the first hut at the Routeburn Flats. Flats would probably have been lakes in geological history, but now completely filled with washed down mountain debris and grassed over.

 

 

Then the second hut and the Lodge at the Routeburn Falls. From there on Scottish Mountain Scenery to the highest point of the crossing at the Harris Saddle and the Harris Shelter. To carry on would take you down into the Sub Tropical Native Bush, and the MacKenzie Hut that I reached from the other side on Monday.

 

The walk so far has been spectacular, and you know why this is one of NZ’s finest tramping routes, but the vista from the Harris Saddle even more so. I had made it in about 4 ½ hours, and you, like me, will have noticed a track to the right going higher still. A sign said Conical Hill 1 hour return: I wasn’t going to miss out, and what an even better viewpoint.

 

When I got to the top I notice a group of people scrabbling around in a little muddy puddle, and it is fairly obvious that something small and valuable has been dropped. A young woman said “It’s not highly expensive, but it’s very emotionally valuable to me” and they had basically given up hope. I am not sure whether I had a premonition, but I thought an alternative eye might be useful, and went over. A quick scan, and, without certainty, I spotted a very small artificial difference to the surface and pointed with my walking pole. “That’s It” the young woman cried out. It was an earring and I had made Kate from New York and her partner Ryan very happy.

 

Also on the top I was surprised to see another young woman with a distinct bump and I congratulated her on her achievement. I took photos of her and partner for them on their camera on the way down, and was astounded to realise they were doing exactly as I, the Eastern half from bottom to top, with Conical Hill as well, all in the day. 

A ten hour walk overall: 27km. (16 miles) 2000 metres of ascent and descent, plus for them the drive from and back to Queenstown, at least 1½ hours each way.

Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised when I learned that Jen Pond earned her living as a GP on the Island of Bute, but also did lots of charity work in Zambia, India and Everest ER, and there had met her Kiwi partner Bruce Hasler, an Everest and Himalayan Guide with Himex.

 

 

The baby is 36 weeks already, and they now have to work out how family life is going to work from now on. Best wishes to all 3, and any further additions to the family.

I can tell you that I was tired enough when I got back home.