tramping new zealand

I woke with the sound of numerous birds doing their early morning thing.

Then, a bright red sky slowly made an appearance through the large east-facing window and remained on show for ten minutes.

As usual, it took some time to get moving, but it’s always easier to return when much of the route is downhill. I was back at the car relatively early, so thought it was the opportunity to put the muffler bandage I’d picked up the day before on the hole in the muffler.

That took a while as it was behind the rear wheel, and I could only use one hand due to poor ground clearance. Still, eventually it was on, and I put a hose clamp over the top to hold it in position.

Now 11 am, I found some Internet connectivity and solved my mystery as to where my next hut, Back Creek Biv, was located, as it isn’t shown on the LINZ Topo50 maps.

It wasn’t far away, so I made my way there. Surprisingly, a few minutes after parking my car by the side of the road, someone else turned up who was heading that way with her dog, but then doing a 3 km cross-country to MacLennan Hut for the night.

I left and started making my way up the hill. Lots of mature rata and fuchsia among the other succulent species, which are attractive to deer and possums. You don’t get that in the Richmond Range behind Nelson these days.

Nor have I ever been dive-bombed by a falcon, but that happened a few times, although without ever coming close.

More intimidating than anything else.

The stray woman caught up and came for a look at the hut while I was having a late lunch. Neither of us stayed long. I had to head back down after my 1.5 hour uphill, mainly on a four-wheel-drive track.

Then it was a case of getting around to Thisbe Hut. Well, that hut isn’t shown on LINZ maps either, although MacLennan Hut, where I hoped to go the following day, maybe as a day trip, is.

Thisbe Hut is quite close to the road where I’d parked my car, and in fact, I could still see it while it was light.

I had enough time to sort out a mouse in the water tank issue. Two months before, the tank had been cleaned out, and a shade cloth filter was put across the incoming pipe. Except that three mice had been trapped by the filter fabric, which meant the water was filtered by dead mouses. It did not smell good.

I cleaned them out and drained the tank. The forecast was for heavy rain in five days, so the lack of water only inconvenienced me, in all probability. I went back down the hill 150 m to get fresh water from the stream.

By that stage, it had just started raining.

The mice were something out of a horror movie.