Milford Track: Helicopter Rescue!

Photos to follow.
Back in Te Anau following our adventures on the Milford Track (54km from the top of Lake Te Anau to Milford Sound). Everything we took with us is currently drying on our balcony. Milford Sound receives more than 8m of rain per year (London receives less than 1m) and we got over 500mm of that in 48 hours! To give you an idea, in the last hut Ranger Ross gave us the weather forecast for the following day as "if you look across the valley there is a big rock. If you can see the rock, it's going to rain. If you can't, it's raining." It was great though. 4 days of amazing scenery. Even the rain brought to life hundreds of waterfalls on the valley walls. Day 3 saw us cross the Mackinnon Pass where there is the loo with a view. You can sit on the loo and look out onto the mountains. We also saw the 5th highest waterfall in the world (Sutherland Falls) but I wasn't impressed as the heavens opened at the same time and by the time we reached the hut for the night I was drenched. Ah well, our newly-purchased and highly fetching thermals (including Pete's stripey long-johns) kept us toasty. Day 4 saw confirmation that Pete and Faye are jinxed when it comes to great walks (the last one was closed due to avalanches, remember)... after over 250mm of rain overnight we set off towards Milford Sound only to meet Ranger Ross coming up the track with our hut-mates from the night before in tow. One of the rivers was so flooded that the track was impassable. So they brought in a helicopter to ferry us and our packs across the flood! Only the second time it's happened this season, apparently. The flight was amazing. The valley looked fantastic with all the waterfalls and the mist and the raging river. Unfortunately for us they only ferried us across the flood, not to the end of the track, so we then had another 8km or so until we reached the breath-taking Milford Sound. We'd seen it a couple of days earlier on a kayak trip but seeing it again took nothing away from its majesty. Fiordland is truly a stunning place (I know Fi, who has just turned 30 - congratulations my friend! - was blown away by it). Now we're back here in Te Anau, stuffing our faces, doing our laundry and waiting for our calf muscles to stop their spasms before we book onto Great Walk #3 - Kepler. God only knows what the jinx will hold for us there... this one has a mountain pass that is prone to gales. So fingers crossed we don't end up having a free base-jump as well as yesterday's free chopper ride, eh?!

Routeburn Track: Avalanches, Amazing Views And Ankle-strain

I survived! Oh yes... hike chick made it to the end of a 5 day hike! We have completed our second "Great Walk" (although the first was a canoe, so does that count?) and tagged on another 2-day track just for the fun (agony?) of it. Day 1 saw us walk up through beech forest up a big hill to the Routeburn Falls hut. At 1000m above sea level, this place was idyllic... looking out onto snow-capped peaks and down to the valley below (when the clouds cleared). Day 2 we were all set to go over the top of the Harris Saddle when disaster struck. The wardens closed the track as the avalanche risk was too great! 2 people had been caught up to their necks the day before. Arg! So we hung around for another night. Day 3 brought elation as we were allowed to continue on our adventure and we skipped up to the Harris Saddle, made sure we didn't stop through the avalanche zone and were rewarded with the most amazing scenery ever. Pete's going to set up an album of photos as there are just too many for one blog. That day we walked for about 6 hours (20km) to get to the Howden hut (where some Aussies rewarded us with some red wine) but the views on the way were so breathtaking I hardly felt the pain. We were asleep by 9 each night, happily dreaming of bright blue skies, crystal clear lakes and lots of snow. Day 4 saw the day of hell on the Caples... we had to walk through rivers (my boots are still not dry - putting them back on when they'd been outside all night and there was a morning frost was character-building, to say the least), climb an hour over tree-roots and rocks and then we walked about 4 hours through dark sunless forest over tree roots where we had to calculate every step. It was exhausting and I hated hiking by the time we reached the hut (it was like Blair Witch, honestly). My ankle still hurts. Not impressed. Anyway, day 5 redeemed the 2-day Caples track for us... with mist-filled cow-fields, lunch with some lovely ladies who put us to shame (one had had a double hip replacement!) and an encounter with a bull in the middle of the track (which was a bit hairy). Ah. We're back into hiking again now and have bought lovely thermals to help us tackle the Kepler track towards the end of next week (I look irresistible in mine and Pete's long-johns are stripey - imagine!) I should be stick thin after all this exercise but I'm not... we managed to take real food with us on the tramp and since returning to Queenstown we have once again eaten ourselves stupid. Lovely stuff. Happy Easter everyone!

Check out the photos!

Yup, have finally reached the civilisation of Queenstown, so have a look at my trip in glorious technicolour now that the blogs have been updated with the photos. Pete's site has loads more. Remember to click on any picture to enlarge it (just in case you're really missing us).

South Island: Beaches, Glaciers And Waterproofs

Hello from lovely Queenstown! Since my last blog entry we have done quite a bit... we hiked 2 days in Abel Tasman National Park which included some hairy river tidal crossings - at one we made a cup of tea whilst waiting for the water levels to subside!
The walk was lovely, but our first experiments with pasta 'n' sauce dinners (to cut down on pack weight) resulted in a very miserable Hike Chick. I was not impressed. I had hiked all day only to eat shit at the end of it. Lesson learned. Check out the foxy photo of us in a DOC hut...

We had a 1 day kayak back to base and we kayaked alongside a seal colony! They were swimming next to us and everything.

After that we chilled in Nelson for another couple of days and then headed down to Punakaiki (famous for its Pancake Rocks). A one night stop-off there to break up the long bus journey turned into 3 lovely days in the smallest place ever.. but it was right on the Tasman Sea and our backpackers was about 20m from the beach - the best day/night was spent in our own static gypsy caravan drinking tea in bed with the front door open so that we could watch the raging storm and the huge waves outside. Bliss.
After that came the glaciers. In Franz Josef we met Pete and Claire, who were a bad influence and got us drunk. Thanks guys! It was fun! At Fox we went on a half-day hike on the ice. Amazing scenery. Mad blue ice and lots of puddles to stick my stick in.


Yesterday we arrived in Queenstown which is stunning. We've already spent far too much cash... eating out (best burger ever, according to Pete, who knows his burgers) and preparing for our next intrepid adventure... on Monday we start the famous Routeburn Track - a 3 day hike that we are combining with the Caples Track to make a 5 day round-trip hike (with clothes, food, sleeping bag and stove on our little backs). Thanks to the present of some NZ dollars from all my friends at KC I have just bought a very waterproof jacket to keep me toasty and warm. Thanks! Not as rock and roll as a camper van guys but I definitely will appreciate it (it's pissing with rain here right now). Watch this space to find out how it went next weekend (needless to say there will be no more pasta 'n' sauce: Food Hitler has bought one little bottle for oil, one for soy - stir fry noodles here we come!)