Avalanche Peak

Dale and I were planning on "raging" between October 15th and October 26th which meant we'd go down to Fiordlands and try to do three of the Great Walks. Because of the weather we found ourselves stuck in Christchurch for the first few days of that. The weather looked O.K. in Arthur's Pass so we booked a shuttle and headed out to hike up Avalanche Peak via Scott's Track.

Dale put this together:

Here's the start of the track. The sign says 4 hours to the top.

Above photo by Dale Statler

The trail went up through bush for about 45 minutes before putting us in the snow. We were pushing pretty hard because we had to get down in time to catch the shuttle back to Christchurch. As a result, I have no pictures from this part of the walk.

Getting up into the snow was very exciting for me. I'd only done it once before (Tongariro Crossing). Here it was actually important at times to use the axe properly and place my feet well.

Above photo by Dale Statler



This video is horribly washed out but gives an idea of some of the steeper terrain encountered.

We made it to the top in 2 hours and were both surprised and pleased.

above photo by Dale Statler

There was a skiier and a snowboarder at the top of the peak when we got there. They were checking the snow pack to assess the avalanche risk before skiing down. Dale and I found this very interesting as we had been to a lecture with the Tramping Club on avalanche safety that described this process. We watched for about 15 minutes.


Then we headed down.

above photo by Dale Statler

Most of the walk was not suitible for glissading but there was one spot where I got my first proper glissade in.

above photo by Dale Statler

We got down in only an hour and thirty minutes putting us at a total of 3.5 hours to tramp up and down (quite different from the sign that said 4 hours to the top). We can go pretty fast when we're pushed for time.

We got back into Arthur's Pass village and waited for the shuttle to come back through from Greymouth. While we waited some Kea managed to grab my scroggin. Many of the tourists took photos of the event and one agreed to email me a photo. Here it is:

above photograph by Tanja Lenz (Thanks!!)

I managed to get the scroggin back before the kea had feasted too much, but I had to discard it as they'd torn many holes in the bag. Darn alpine parrots. Get your own food!

North Island Trip End: Wellington

We woke up at Triple X Hut which, it turned out, looked like this:


We started early and as a result saw this beautiful sunburst. click this photo to enlarge. it is worth it.


We then headed south towards Wellington. On the way we saw a sign for Rivendell and pulled off the road. The area where Rivendell was shot doesn't look much like Rivendell from the LoTR films but it was certainly a beautiful area.


When we got to Wellington the first thing we did was navigate to the Botanical Gardens and have a bite to eat. Then down to the hostel to drop off our stuff, over to the Apex car place to drop off the car and down to the water.

I found Wellington to be a bit like Hamilton in Bermuda.


A shot of Te Papa, the great New Zealand museum. We went in the next day.


One particularly cool exhibit had a map of New Zealand on the floor that you would walk across. As you stepped on different areas the walls would light up and show highlights of history in the areas.


In the evening we caught the cable car up to the gardens to get a view out over Wellington at night.



The next morning we caught breakfast at an amazing place called Restaurant l'Affare. Great coffee, great food.


Then we did Te Papa and went into the Wellington Library which was really nice. I read a quick history of New Zealand.

Being the walkers we are, we decided to go up to Mount(hill?) Victoria to get a view out over Wellington from a different direction.

We walked up this hill to the start of the forested walk.


At the top I took this pretty poor "myspace" photo. Not so good but the best I've got.


After we hiked down the hill we sat for a while and had an apple before going to get our stuff and go to the Airport. I took advantage of some of the nearby structures.


Then we went to the airport and flew back to Christchurch! I wrote a bunch of postcards in the airport as we waited for out flight. We didn't have to go through security to get to the gate. Weird!

Though my North Island adventures were fantastic and enjoyable I can't wait to blog about my more recent tramps up Avalanche Peak and French Ridge. Each of those hikes got well up into the snow and as such were technically more demanding and in a way more exciting than any walk I've ever done.

North Island Days 8 and 9: Wanganui, Napier

We woke up at Ketetahi Hut on the backside of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing in weather as bad as the day before. We decided we would not be able to see anything so we headed down and gave up on the Tongariro Northern Crossing for now (i'll be back).



We got the car and drove up to the DoC to inform them we were down safely. Then we took off south through the Wanganui Gorge (featured in LoTR) to Wanganui.


As we rolled into town the car began to act up. It had been doing some funny things and the battery light had been turning on since before we got the car (it was on when we were picked up at the airport i'd noted). But never as funny as this. I turned off the lights, wipers, and A/C and we made our way into town. We got to the DoC where we were headed and got information on a place to stay in the Eastern Ruahine's. We planned to drive over and check out Napier and then go West into the Ruahine's for another night of hut sleep.

When we got back to the car it wouldn't start so we called up the AA people who sent a car. After waiting 20 minutes I gave the car another try and it started. We headed out of town and called them up saying we no longer needed a rescue but the car began to act funny after just a couple kilometers. I stopped the car at a gas station and turned it off. This time when I tried turning it off it gave no hint of trying to start. We called for help and it arrived in only ten minutes. We were very impressed by the service. The gentleman gave my battery a jolt and told me to follow him. The car broke down in the middle of the road on the way to the shop and the guy came back and hit me with another jolt. We drove into the shop where we found out that the car's alternator was shot and that it couldn't be replaced for a couple days.

We called Apex and they told us the best they could do was send us another car up from Wellington the next day and we told them that would be fine. We found a hostel in Wanganui for the night and the guy running the auto shop gave us a lift with our stuff.

Waiting at the car shop while they have a look. They had real drip coffee!!

Here's our hostel room. It was very nice and totally inexpensive for the quality.


The next morning we grabbed breakfast at "The Cracked Pepper" (if i recall) and I had the best Eggs Benedict I ever have (as I certainly recall). Rachel had some crazy focaccia french toast or something. With kiwifruit!


We got the car and headed east to Napier. The guy who brought us the car had a spare battery and tried to drive the car back down to Wellington on two fully charged batteries instead of waiting to get the alternator fixed in Wanganui.

The drive we took to Napier, called the Taihape - Napier road, was fantastic. Part of it was unsealed but our new car could definitely take it.



We cruised into Napier with its art deco style.


And drove up a hill to get a look out at the main shipping bay and the town.


Then we headed west to the Ruahines to get some sleep. The hut we were looking for appeared to be immediately on the side of the road and there was little information in the pamphlet I'd bought describing how to get to it. We ended up driving around in the sticks looking for DoC signs for an hour before getting totally frustrated and stopping at the first farmer's house we could. The farmers were very nice to us and called up someone they thought would know about the hut and we found out the hut we were trying to access was now accessible only via private land and was no longer even a DoC hut! Though this wasted heaps of our time we did see some very dramatic light and scenery.


We altered our plans a bit and headed south to another hut that was supposed to be a 20 minute walk in. By this time it was totally dark. I nearly drove right over a sheep sitting in the middle of the road which would have been a real bummer. We got in to the hut, called "Triple X Hut", and crashed.

North Island Days 6 and 7

Day 6

Woke up at the kiwi fruit farm and went for a look around the property which was beautiful. It was very early and I was not thinking so I did not have my camera.


We left by 8:30 AM to head down through Rotorua to Tongariro National Park for the main highlight of the trip.

Dipped our feet in some naturally heated thermal pools in a park in Rotorua. We didn't want to pay for any of the expensive thermal spectacles of the area.



We stopped at Huka Falls on the way down which was spectacular but, alas, I didn't bring my camera and Rachel claims her photos do it no justice. Follow this link to have a look at the falls.


Then we gunned it down to Taupo where we loaded up on food and dropped off a camera and phone we'd found at a backcountry hut in Egmont National Park. We'd texted the owners and arranged for them to pick up the goods at the visitor center. Taupo was beautiful and it was great to look across the huge crater lake at the mountains we'd be hiking up the next day. Unfortunately this is the best photo I've got my hands on right now. I'm trying to eat the mountains.


We got to the Whakapapa DoC in Tongariro National Park and the employees convinced us out of starting the Northern Circuit so late in the day as they expected the snow would slow us down considerably. We decided to go into Mangatepopo Hut on one side of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing and try to cross the next day. If the weather was poor we'd wait around and try to do it the day after that. We were determined to give this hike a chance to be all that we wanted it to be. Here are the mountains we'd be climbing up around. On the right is Ngauruhoe and off to the left is Mt. Tongariro. Ngauruhoe was used as Mt. Doom in LOTR.


Here's Mangatepopo hut where we stayed that night.


That night we went out to check out the stars and we found this opossum.


Day 7

We got up the next day and despite poor weather decided to try to do the Alpine Crossing as we'd planned.

Conditions weren't great but heaps of snow had fallen over the last week which was exciting for us.


Stuff along the path was frozen up solid which was very cool.


We got to a sign where there was a turn off for a side trip to climb Ngauruhoe and just after it we bumped into a party coming back towards the start. They told us to turn around. Here's a video of me explaining the details.



So we decided to go down the way we'd come and go around to get up to Ketetahi Hut on the other side of the crossing. There we'd wait for another day to come and hope for better weather to do the other half of the hike in.

We crossed what's called "Ketetahi Hot Springs". The river was warm and it cut through the snow easily.


The ground was smoking. Very cool. Reminded me of visitng Centralia.



I got this eerie shot of a slip we crossed over just before arriving at Ketetahi Hut.


And finally we made it to the hut which was supposed to have an amazing view. The visitor's book in the hut was loaded with comments like "best view ever". Anyways, here's what we saw.


And that's how we finished day 7. Had some dinner in the hut which we had to ourselves and fell asleep hoping for good weather.