Johnson/Kākāpō/Wangapeka blog | February 2025
After my Heaphy Track rampage with my sister and her husband, I had a few leisurely days in Karamea. Exactly what was needed. Time was spent hanging out at the Last Resort once again and generally drinking too much coffee.
After the five days on the Heaphy Track, much in the drizzle, it was time to dry out the contents of my pack and load the new food aboard that I’d posted to Karamea.
My plan was to get to Johnson Hut as one of the last three Kahurangi huts I needed to complete the set.
It’s quite the expedition to get there, but I might as well do it now that Andrew Barker has put enormous effort into re-cutting and re-marking the track, and I’m feeling fit and frisky.
I can also get back to Kākāpō Hut.
That will all be a test of my physical state, and plenty of time will be on my lonesome.
The idea is to essentially walk the Wangapeka Track with an excursion to Johnson Hut, returning to Belltown Manunui Hut, and then going over Kākāpō Saddle via Kākāpō Hut rather than Little Wanganui Saddle.
Sounds like a plan, but not the easiest way to get back home to Nelson.
Might have plenty of solitude on this trip.
There are just enough markers to see where to go, although it really needs a few dozen people over it to start making the route more discernible on the ground.
I spoke to the DOC contractor about stoats, they love mayonnaise, lidar use in measuring canopy growth in forests, plastic traps, etc.
I’d had some trepidation about the unknown, particularly as very energetic people had written about the high demands of the route, but as in life in general, it just unfolded from hour to hour.
Instead of the boulders/river crossing, I had moss-covered boulders and climbed much higher up the hill in the forest.
It was Day 6 for me, and I’d only managed to get three hours from the roadend.
Kākāpō has become a thing. Kākāpō Hut. Kākāpō River valley. Kākāpō Saddle.
With the massive quantity of dry firewood from the enlargement of the helicopter landing area, I did something unusual. Lit a fire.
I was pretty wet when I staggered into Helicopter Hut to find the last occupants were the three blokes I had met at Belltown four nights previously.
Down the other side is a rockfall area with some ominous new moss-free boulders of significant size, having made their way to the creek since my last visit. Looking up, it looked as if others might join them soon enough.
Hitching can be frustrating if you are that type. Cars that you think would stop, don’t. Eventually, someone unexpected does.
