We had the privilege of writing this blog-post twice! No thanks to Blogsy...
Tue February 12- After a good night's sleep in a real bed we enjoyed a nice cooked breakfast at the Ardwyn House B&B in Greymouth. The bacon & eggs were a welcome change to our oatmeal! We said goodbye to the owner (who had a McDonald's drive-thru VIP sticker on her car ?!? ) and set out on our drive south. In 2 days we would start the Routeburn Track from the town of Te Anau, about 400 miles south of Greymouth. We drove along the west-coast highway, across many one-lane bridges, through temperate rainforest, along beautiful wild beaches and passing the Franz Jozef and Fox Glaciers. A beautiful drive actually! When we got to Wanaka we decided to call it a day. We setup camp at the holiday park, made dinner and had a beer in the nice town.
Wed February 13- We continued our drive south and stopped in Queenstown for morning coffee. We got trekking-groceries and looked for a new pair of hiking poles to replace Maurits' broken ones. No luck though... Maurits would be a "one-poler" for the upcoming treks. We also picked up our Routeburn track tickets at the DOC (national parks service). The Routeburn is a 32 kilometer one-way trek and one of New Zealand's nine "Great Walks." A great walk means; reservations required, busy with foreign (no kiwis) tourists, but this is compensated by the world class scenery. We drove the last leg to Te Anau and setup camp at the Lakeview Holiday Park. A very nice campsite with an excellent kitchen and dining-area. Most holiday parks in New Zealand provide a communal kitchen and sitting-area, but this one was exceptionally nice!
Thu February 14- Routeburn Track Day 1
We packed up our tent in the dark and by 7 we were on the Tracknet bus (back) to Queenstown. We had to pre-arrange transportation to and from the track as it was a one-way journey. Once in Queenstown we had a 2.5 hour layover that we spent at the local Starbucks. Around noon we boarded the next bus that took us to the Routeburn trailhead. Quite a trek to get to the trek, but at 2pm we were on the trail! The weather was fine; cloudy, but luckily no rain. Our first day was short. We walked on an easy trail through a beech forest, following the Routeburn (burn = river), and after about 2 hours we got to our campsite at the Routeburn Flats. A beautiful grassy valley (red tussock we think...) with views of the cloud covered peaks. Since we were now on a 'great walk,' we (as campers) were not allowed to use the hut for cooking and sitting. Instead the DOC provided a nice shelter with a sink and picnic benches! While we were hanging out at the shelter, talking to the other campers, we witnessed a noisy but sweet air-show of a helicopter dropping off and picking up supplies. Quite impressive how the pilot maneuvered a "Bobcat excavator" underneath the chopper!
Fri February 15- Routeburn Track Day 2
The weather forecast had been predicting lots of rain, but we woke to a nice morning! We left just after 8 and made our way up to the Routeburn Falls. The two huts (one self-guided DOC hut and one guided UltimateHikes lodge) were bustling with departing hikers. The great walks can indeed be packed! With the crowds we continued our way up to Harris Saddle. On the saddle it was more cloudy than in the valley, but the weather was good enough to go up Conical Hill. A worthwhile side-trip with beautiful views over Fiordland and Mount Aspiring National Parks. After lunch we continued along a spectacular 'face-trail' high above the Hollyford Valley. Even though it was a little cloudy the views of the valley, the mountains and in the distance the Tasman Sea were phenomenal! As good as hiking gets! After quite a long day we descended into the Lake Mackenzie area and setup our tent on a little piece of AstroTurf. Our first time camping on fake grass...
Sat February 16- Routeburn Track Day 3
As we went to sleep the clouds came down from the mountains and settled into our (hanging) valley. It was a rather damp night and in the morning there was literally zero visibility! We packed up the wettest tent ever and set out on our last Routeburn day. The hike today went mainly through beautiful green forest, but as the morning neared its end, the clouds lifted and we got some good views. After we passed the Earland Falls (big waterfall) and the Lake Howden hut, we arrived at the turn-off to Key Summit. Since we had plenty of time before the Tracknet bus would drive us back to Te Anau, we decided to go up. Key Summit was gorgeous with great views! The foggy / clouded over peaks were spectacular! We took our time and immediately decided that if we had a clearish day we should take Peter & Shelley up here (LB's parents would be coming to NZ in a couple of days). After we had a slow lunch, we made our way down to 'The Divide' car-park where the bus took us back to the Lakeview Holiday paah'k in Te Anau. The kiwis (and Aussies for that matter), like them New Englanders, do not like pronouncing the R (aah)...
By 4 we were back in Te Anau where the weather was superb. We setup our tent, but did not go get pizza and beer. Instead we went to the store for some cold beer and fresh fruit and vegetables. We enjoyed the lovely sunny evening and even went for a little walk along the lake (there is a big lake near Te Anau - surprisingly it is called Lake Te Anau). We walked back to our tent and found that a big group with 6 tents had setup camp right next to us! We unstaked our tent, carried it to the far corner of the camping-field and restaked it. Yes, we are pretty difficult...
Sun February 17- Rest Day! Low clouds (fog) in the morning, but the afternoon was crystal clear. We did laundry, wrote a little bit on our blog, got the Kepler Track tickets at the DOC and picked up some trekking-food. We also went for a little stroll along the lake, but since it was hot and we were tired, we quickly turned around!
Mon February 18- Kepler Track Day 1
Our last night in our tent! The zippers of our palace no longer 'caught' properly and it had become very hard to close the doors. Our tent had done a more than excellent job so we decided to retire him/her. We ordered a new tent (same one) and LB's parents would deliver it to us personally in 4 days.
But before we would get our new tent, we first had to walk the 61 kilometer Kepler Track. For the very first time we would be staying in huts! There were two campsites on the Kepler, but it seemed a long day of walking to get from one to the other. So we (Maurits) decided to try the huts. We had a slow morning, packed up and by 11 we were on the Kepler walking towards Moturau Hut. (Much easier that the Kepler is a circuit so no need to arrange transport!). Another crystal clear and warm day. The trail was fantastic! A very wide and easy going 'grandma' trail - we could have been in the forests around Emmen! Just the beech trees and the crystal clear river were a little of out place. We got to Moturau hut, beautifully situated on Lake Manapouri, around 3. Given the superb weather we went for a swim! The water and beach were beautiful! Just too bad there were a bazillion sandflies...
As is custom on the great walks, after dinner the ranger holds a hut talk. Foremost this talk is about fire-safety, but in addition the ranger adds something interesting about kiwis, bats (only native mammal to New Zealand), blue ducks or something else. On this first ranger talk, the ranger continued about the bats for over an hour! We almost missed the stunning sunset! The other 5 hut talks we had in New Zealand were better and shorter - sometimes even very funny!
Tue February 19- Kepler Track Day 2
Hmmmm... The huts might not have been such a good idea... We had a lousy night! A young male with quite some fatty tissue in the neck-area 'sleep-apnea-ed' the night away. Snoring can be bad - but this was beyond words! Luckily we were going against the general counter-clockwise stream of people and we knew he would not be in our bunk-room tonight. We left at 9 and continued up the valley towards Iris Burn. The trail was yet again easy going, through the forest, and like yesterday we walked about 50% faster than the sign-posted walking times. Around 12:30 we got to the Iris Burn Hut. It was once more a crystal clear day and we quickly decided to do the first section of tomorrow's walk to get above the tree line for some mountain views. The Iris Burn hut ranger thought we were a bit crazy and told us that we should instead go and look at the nearby waterfall. We thought she was a little crazy for not encouraging us to climb up... We more or less speed-hiked to the tree-line and then continued on (at a normal pace) to the Hanging Valley Shelter. The views along the ridge-trail on this glorious day were spectacular! A very good choice to go up! But the 900 meters up and back down again did make us pretty tired.
Back at the hut we found 20 high school kids in our bunk-room! They were on a field-trip from the Singapore American School (SAS). The American School Singapore would have given a better acronym, but unfortunately they chose different... We had a very nice evening talking to the SAS trip-leaders; a gym-teacher from Amsterdam and a psychologist from Wisconsin. The Dutch gym-teacher had even played tennis in Emmen! We also met a young Irishman living in Somerville, MA- such a small world!
Wed February 20- Kepler Track Day 3
We had a very good night's sleep - no snorers amongst the youngsters! We got up, looked out and saw that it was cloudy! A confirmation that it was a good idea to go up yesterday. We took our time and left around 9:30. We could immediately feel yesterday's effort in our tired legs! We skipped the Iris Burn Falls and walked back up to the Hanging Valley Shelter. The high level clouds and strong winds made it quite cool during our morning tea of snickers and trail-mix. Today's walk to Luxmore Hut was all above the tree-line and even though it was overcast, it was beautiful. Around 3 we were happy to arrive at Luxmore Hut, fantastically situated with great mountain views! Very pretty! Unfortunately the wilderness scenery was hard to enjoy with 55 other people in the hut... It got so loud in the dining/cooking area (also due to bad acoustics) that we had to go to our 40 person bunk-room to be able to read... Yes, we know, we are being difficult! :-)
Thu February 21- Kepler Track Day 4
Imagine 40 people in a bunk-room with all the windows closed... The ear-plugs did do a great job though, because we both slept pretty good! The valley was completely fogged in as we started our walk back to the car. Soon we were back in the forest on an excellent trail! Lovely walking, but no views. Around 11 we arrived at our car - much faster than initially planned. Our biggest complaint of the Kepler track: the walking-times are incredibly overestimated! Only at the end of our 4-day walk was there a sign that stated that fit hikers could cut the forecasted walking-times in half. We had to agree with that sign... The Kepler track was beautiful! But next time we will camp and do the trek in 2 nights.
Because we were off the trail so early, we had time for coffee and delicious carrot-cake in Te Anau. Satisfied we got in the car and drove to Spinnaker Bay apartments in Queenstown where we would meet-up with Peter & Shelley (LB's parents). They had arrived earlier in the morning and we would spend the next 16 days with them! On our way to Queenstown we had picked up some groceries for dinner so we could spend the evening relaxing in the apartment. Shelley had picked very well - a beautiful apartment overlooking the big lake that Queenstown is on. Quite the view! It was of course great to see them again and we celebrated our reunion with some drinks and a dinner of salad and fresh pasta.
Blogsy is not the ideal app...
you guys are so cool! haha B-)
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