Hello all, so the past 4 days we have been Tramping in Fiordland and
Mount aspiring National Parks. We covered 70 kilometers over 4 days, which was fairly comfortable and allowed plenty of time for relaxing and meeting people in the backcountry huts. The first day was a 6 and a half hour walk over most of the routeburn track, one of NZ's great walks, and the hut we stayed in had 50beds, gas cookers and lights!! The views on the first day were fairly spectacular and we had good weather for the time we were walking. However when we reached the hut the rain started to come in, that evening the hut ranger gave us a talk saying that this area of NZ recieves 7m of rainfall annually, and 200 wet days a year. That night the rain was torrential and the following morning when we set off to walk it was still coming down. The effect on the walking track was spectacular, the hillsides were gushing torrents of water, and at no point over the next 3hours of walking did we escape the sound of cascading water. It made for a pretty walk but we were sodden when we arrived at the next hut, a much smaller affair with simply bunks and rainwater supplied taps. Here we met a kiwi teacher, an American traveller called Aaron and a french mountaineer called Arian who was training for his attempt at two 8000m peaks in the summer. The next day was a very short day, with only 4hours of walking where we met up with the kiwi again at the hut for the night. A routine walk out the following day (today) and met up with Aaron and Arian in the carpark and made plans for a big fat burger to treat ourslelves. And this was no ordinary burger, $16 of beef bacon egg and salad. I think we deserved it after our hiking efforts. Next we are heading up the west coast. Blog soon.
Rich
Mount aspiring National Parks. We covered 70 kilometers over 4 days, which was fairly comfortable and allowed plenty of time for relaxing and meeting people in the backcountry huts. The first day was a 6 and a half hour walk over most of the routeburn track, one of NZ's great walks, and the hut we stayed in had 50beds, gas cookers and lights!! The views on the first day were fairly spectacular and we had good weather for the time we were walking. However when we reached the hut the rain started to come in, that evening the hut ranger gave us a talk saying that this area of NZ recieves 7m of rainfall annually, and 200 wet days a year. That night the rain was torrential and the following morning when we set off to walk it was still coming down. The effect on the walking track was spectacular, the hillsides were gushing torrents of water, and at no point over the next 3hours of walking did we escape the sound of cascading water. It made for a pretty walk but we were sodden when we arrived at the next hut, a much smaller affair with simply bunks and rainwater supplied taps. Here we met a kiwi teacher, an American traveller called Aaron and a french mountaineer called Arian who was training for his attempt at two 8000m peaks in the summer. The next day was a very short day, with only 4hours of walking where we met up with the kiwi again at the hut for the night. A routine walk out the following day (today) and met up with Aaron and Arian in the carpark and made plans for a big fat burger to treat ourslelves. And this was no ordinary burger, $16 of beef bacon egg and salad. I think we deserved it after our hiking efforts. Next we are heading up the west coast. Blog soon.
Rich
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