tramping new zealand

Rain had been predicted for yesterday, and some arrived overnight.

My tent received a smattering, but at 5 am it was time to transfer to the interior of the hut. Try to keep my tent mostly dry.

I had bought a foldable 3-litre water bottle for this summer to supplement a smaller one, and that provided sufficient water for both dinner and breakfast. Lucky, because it was a five-minute walk each way to the murky stream.

The odd shower swept through, but never lasted long.

By 7 30 am, I was marching off towards civilisation, reasonably early for me.

After all the four-wheel-drive crowds up in the Old Man Range the day before, mainly moving in the wrong direction for random hitchhikers, maybe I would not be required to walk the full distance.

I could cope with an easier day after around 60,000 steps in the previous two days, including plenty of climbing.

The clouds had lifted, and I found myself in solitude. Maybe the weather forecast scared them off.

The first task was to retrace my steps to yesterday’s lunchtime turn-off at Hyde Rock. It was around 10 km, with an unrelenting uphill climb more noticeable than when I came down.

I finally got my head around the landscape features, perhaps confused by the initial whiteout. I could identify the roads from a distance, and now the Potters Huts seemed a long way down the hill, and eventually they disappeared behind a ridge.

It’s easy enough walking the four-wheel-drive tracks. The hardest part is where they spread out into a number of parallel tracks.

At Potters Hut, I read about the explanation for the closely aligned square stone mounds at surprisingly regular intervals I’d been wondering about. They had been built in the 1870s after 23 miners had perished in savage whiteout conditions on their way to Potters Number 2 goldfield. Originally, the stones had beech sapling poles and Number 8 wire stretched between them.

Mystery solved, but the age of the implementation was a surprise. 160 years ago!

Once I made it to Hyde Rock, the road improved, and the sporadic stone rock formations became more numerous.

A few four-wheel drives appeared, but again, they were going the wrong direction. Eventually, I made it to the Nicholsons Hut turn-off where I’d started my hiking, and that meant it was time to head back down the hill in a hurry.

A 700 m drop to my car, on the steepest trajectory of the day. Elevation was lost in a hurry.

Some four-wheel drives had passed me, heading in the right direction, but they had their windows closed, presumably to keep the environment or any stray hikers out. Straight past, but I didn’t mind.

This was my mountain, and I was enjoying my exhilarating day, looking down into the Clutha River Valley in one direction and over to where I had walked the day before, along another ridge.

700 m is a lot of elevation to lose after three long days of exercise, which affects different muscles. And toes.

One last diversion was to White Hut, an old stone gold mining hut that was beautifully constructed.

With New Year’s Day coming up and being the height of the summer holiday season, I had to find somewhere to perch for a couple of days to rest up. I’d been on the go for a few days now, and I thought that somewhere near Wānaka would be as good as anywhere.

Yes, I’d walked past the Alberttown DOC campsite on my Te Araroa Little Adventure. If I stayed there, I could enjoy some rest, relaxation, and decent food in Wānaka, while staying in an $11-a-night campsite.

Sounded like a plan.