Awesome write-up with great photos! Thanks so much for posting.
I got back from our final tour around NZ, as we are leaving for the UK in about two weeks. Photos still at the lab and I'll probably never scan them - sorry!
We started off in Dunedin and went for a "gentle" 2-day walk in the Silverpeaks, staying at ABC cave which looks like this:
Then went back to the car along a ridge I'd never been on before. A bit of a mistake as it was pretty rocky and the bush was really very dense. Plus there was no water and 30+ degrees. We made it back to the car about 7pm.
This is a fairly good representation of the landscape, just up and down, up and down, up and down all day... the biggest peak is only 900m but this route had over 2,500m climbing in 15kms.
Then the next day we went off to the West Coast. The West Coast is absolutely incredible - a thin slice of flat land, maybe a mile wide, with the Southern Ocean on one side and 3,500m mountains on the other. It's one of the wettest places in the world and as such has probably the densest forest I've ever seen. It's also fucking freezing!
After driving from Dunedin we stayed at Blowfly Hut, which is conveniently only about 1km from the road. We slipped five bucks in the honesty box and had the place to ourselves... until about 2am when two young hunters turned up. They had a pig each so we all had boar steaks for breakfast, which was nice of them.
Then drove up the road for a couple of hours until reaching Fox Glacier for our next proper walk - up the Copland Valley. The walk's flat (for NZ), but the going's rough in places.
After about five hours we made it to most people's destination - the natural hot pools! These come out of the ground at a casseroling 60 degrees, but after flowing down some cultivated terraces they cool to merely 'painfully hot bath' temperatures. These were discovered only a hundred years ago (not even discovered by the Maori previously), which is quite amazing.
Most people stay the night at the big, posh hut here, but after a dip we pushed on through a very overgrown route to Douglas Rock hut (which is on the Western side of Mt. Sefton, which is the big icy place I posted a while back). There were two other trampers there, the only Kiwis we met on this track actually.
Crap photo but I assure you it's amazing. There is a route over the Southern Alps to the Mt. Cook region but it's big, scary, and glaciated - too spooky for me, without a guide at least.
Next day we walked back out in 8 hours, and had huge steaks in the small settlement. We stayed in a hotel, figuring we'd deserved a night in a real bed.
Then we took a couple of days to drive up to the Marlborough region (famous for wine, if you're into wine) and rented a sea kayak for two days, and did an easy overnighter into one of the sounds, camping by the beach. Sorry about the cheesy promo pic, but this is what the area looks like:
Then on the ferry over to Wellington for a few days. The ferry is like New Zealand in microcosm... it's stunningly beautiful... but it's the slowest, shittest, most disorganised, most painfully overpriced ferry I've ever been on. The time spent queueing is almost as long as the actual sailing time. We did cultural stuff in Wellington. We also experienced a traffic jam, which we haven't seen since moving here four years ago... we didn't move for, like, EIGHT minutes.
Then we went north to the Tararuas, which is sort of the spiritual home of tramping in NZ, and famous for atrocious weather. We did the classic Holdsworth-Jumbo circuit, which is 2 nights. The first day we climbed up to the hut through dense native forest. The 30-bunk hut was empty apart from a young local farmer bloke and his long-lost cousin, who was visiting from Surrey. There was a woodburner but in a big, draughty hut it was a chilly night, and I slept in everything I had (polyprop thermals, down jacket, Alpkit down duvet).
The next day it was raining sideways. This is what the ridge (via Mt. Holdsworth at some 1500m) to the next hut would've looked like:
But we couldn't see much at all... thankfully the route had snow poles every 10m so it was easy to stay on track. Upper half stayed dry, lower half in running shorts and trail-runners... yeah, pretty wet. The next hut was much the same as the first, big and empty, and the walk back to the car was pretty in the rain but otherwise uneventful.
In hindsight we should've come back in better weather, they have some cool trails here...
Then we failed to a cheap room in the nearest town due to the Golden Shears sheep-shearing competition... seriously. We stayed in quite a fancy hotel (for NZ) and dined with the Australian team!
Then up to Tongariro National Park, which is quite unlike the rest of NZ in that it's actively volcanic and very, very dry. We went through the Rangipo Desert for two days, stayed in a small, empty hut.
Then joined up with the more popular Tongariro Circuit and stayed in a 20-bunk hut which was populated entirely with Germans. We utterly trounced them at Trivial Pursuit, it was embarrassing. Unfortunately earlier that day I slipped on scree and my left foot ended up under my bum... and consequently couldn't really put any weight on my left knee... oh dear.
Next day we got up at 5:30 knowing we had an 8-hour hilly day back to the car, plus a fucked knee. With painkillers and anti-inflammatories it was okay for the first couple of hours, up to the highest point Red Crater (1,800m). We got here at sunrise and it was incredible.
On the other side, across the plain, the route joins up with a day-walking route where we spotted what looked like a colourful snake... as we got closer we realised it was a chain of people! This area's pretty famous (you may recognise one of these volcanoes from a certain film) and is pushed as one of those 'must-do' things for tourists. Apparently on really busy days, over 1,000 people attempt this day-walk, and by the looks of them, 90% had no idea how steep, long, or remote it was (jeans, flip-flops, fat whinging Australians etc)
Annoyingly we were going against the flow, and the path was pretty narrow. After the first ten minutes I gave up being polite and ended up just barging through. Not much else we could do. After a couple of hours our paths separated and we were on our own again. My knee practically seized up after the painful descent, my partner took my bag and I hobbled the last 5k with two poles... total time was 10hrs!
Then we stayed up around Lake Taupo for a few days, saw friends in Hamilton, back to Welly for a few days, then a massive 9hr drive from the ferry port to Dunedin. I went to the physio and he said I've damaged the ligaments down the outside of my knee - no walking or cycling for six weeks! Which is a bummer as I'd planned to climb Mt. Tapuae-o-Uenuku (2,800m) with mates as a final parting shot.
For what it's worth I drove 4,500km, but my late 90s Ford Falcon is a pretty nice car to cruise in... won't be able to afford to run one of those in the UK, that's for sure. Awesome that you did it in an old Landy!
@lae
Awesome write-up with great photos! Thanks so much for posting.
I got back from our final tour around NZ, as we are leaving for the UK in about two weeks. Photos still at the lab and I'll probably never scan them - sorry!
We started off in Dunedin and went for a "gentle" 2-day walk in the Silverpeaks, staying at ABC cave which looks like this:
Then went back to the car along a ridge I'd never been on before. A bit of a mistake as it was pretty rocky and the bush was really very dense. Plus there was no water and 30+ degrees. We made it back to the car about 7pm.
This is a fairly good representation of the landscape, just up and down, up and down, up and down all day... the biggest peak is only 900m but this route had over 2,500m climbing in 15kms.
Then the next day we went off to the West Coast. The West Coast is absolutely incredible - a thin slice of flat land, maybe a mile wide, with the Southern Ocean on one side and 3,500m mountains on the other. It's one of the wettest places in the world and as such has probably the densest forest I've ever seen. It's also fucking freezing!
After driving from Dunedin we stayed at Blowfly Hut, which is conveniently only about 1km from the road. We slipped five bucks in the honesty box and had the place to ourselves... until about 2am when two young hunters turned up. They had a pig each so we all had boar steaks for breakfast, which was nice of them.
Then drove up the road for a couple of hours until reaching Fox Glacier for our next proper walk - up the Copland Valley. The walk's flat (for NZ), but the going's rough in places.
After about five hours we made it to most people's destination - the natural hot pools! These come out of the ground at a casseroling 60 degrees, but after flowing down some cultivated terraces they cool to merely 'painfully hot bath' temperatures. These were discovered only a hundred years ago (not even discovered by the Maori previously), which is quite amazing.
Most people stay the night at the big, posh hut here, but after a dip we pushed on through a very overgrown route to Douglas Rock hut (which is on the Western side of Mt. Sefton, which is the big icy place I posted a while back). There were two other trampers there, the only Kiwis we met on this track actually.
Crap photo but I assure you it's amazing. There is a route over the Southern Alps to the Mt. Cook region but it's big, scary, and glaciated - too spooky for me, without a guide at least.
Next day we walked back out in 8 hours, and had huge steaks in the small settlement. We stayed in a hotel, figuring we'd deserved a night in a real bed.
Then we took a couple of days to drive up to the Marlborough region (famous for wine, if you're into wine) and rented a sea kayak for two days, and did an easy overnighter into one of the sounds, camping by the beach. Sorry about the cheesy promo pic, but this is what the area looks like:
Then on the ferry over to Wellington for a few days. The ferry is like New Zealand in microcosm... it's stunningly beautiful... but it's the slowest, shittest, most disorganised, most painfully overpriced ferry I've ever been on. The time spent queueing is almost as long as the actual sailing time. We did cultural stuff in Wellington. We also experienced a traffic jam, which we haven't seen since moving here four years ago... we didn't move for, like, EIGHT minutes.
Then we went north to the Tararuas, which is sort of the spiritual home of tramping in NZ, and famous for atrocious weather. We did the classic Holdsworth-Jumbo circuit, which is 2 nights. The first day we climbed up to the hut through dense native forest. The 30-bunk hut was empty apart from a young local farmer bloke and his long-lost cousin, who was visiting from Surrey. There was a woodburner but in a big, draughty hut it was a chilly night, and I slept in everything I had (polyprop thermals, down jacket, Alpkit down duvet).
The next day it was raining sideways. This is what the ridge (via Mt. Holdsworth at some 1500m) to the next hut would've looked like:
But we couldn't see much at all... thankfully the route had snow poles every 10m so it was easy to stay on track. Upper half stayed dry, lower half in running shorts and trail-runners... yeah, pretty wet. The next hut was much the same as the first, big and empty, and the walk back to the car was pretty in the rain but otherwise uneventful.
In hindsight we should've come back in better weather, they have some cool trails here...
Then we failed to a cheap room in the nearest town due to the Golden Shears sheep-shearing competition... seriously. We stayed in quite a fancy hotel (for NZ) and dined with the Australian team!
Then up to Tongariro National Park, which is quite unlike the rest of NZ in that it's actively volcanic and very, very dry. We went through the Rangipo Desert for two days, stayed in a small, empty hut.
Then joined up with the more popular Tongariro Circuit and stayed in a 20-bunk hut which was populated entirely with Germans. We utterly trounced them at Trivial Pursuit, it was embarrassing. Unfortunately earlier that day I slipped on scree and my left foot ended up under my bum... and consequently couldn't really put any weight on my left knee... oh dear.
Next day we got up at 5:30 knowing we had an 8-hour hilly day back to the car, plus a fucked knee. With painkillers and anti-inflammatories it was okay for the first couple of hours, up to the highest point Red Crater (1,800m). We got here at sunrise and it was incredible.
On the other side, across the plain, the route joins up with a day-walking route where we spotted what looked like a colourful snake... as we got closer we realised it was a chain of people! This area's pretty famous (you may recognise one of these volcanoes from a certain film) and is pushed as one of those 'must-do' things for tourists. Apparently on really busy days, over 1,000 people attempt this day-walk, and by the looks of them, 90% had no idea how steep, long, or remote it was (jeans, flip-flops, fat whinging Australians etc)
Annoyingly we were going against the flow, and the path was pretty narrow. After the first ten minutes I gave up being polite and ended up just barging through. Not much else we could do. After a couple of hours our paths separated and we were on our own again. My knee practically seized up after the painful descent, my partner took my bag and I hobbled the last 5k with two poles... total time was 10hrs!
Then we stayed up around Lake Taupo for a few days, saw friends in Hamilton, back to Welly for a few days, then a massive 9hr drive from the ferry port to Dunedin. I went to the physio and he said I've damaged the ligaments down the outside of my knee - no walking or cycling for six weeks! Which is a bummer as I'd planned to climb Mt. Tapuae-o-Uenuku (2,800m) with mates as a final parting shot.
For what it's worth I drove 4,500km, but my late 90s Ford Falcon is a pretty nice car to cruise in... won't be able to afford to run one of those in the UK, that's for sure. Awesome that you did it in an old Landy!