West Coast

I finally got to go on a kayaking trip to the famous west coast of New Zealand. This is known around the world for steep, clean rivers, plenty of rain, and helicopter shuttles. Fortunately, I got to enjoy all of these. I cut out of work a bit early a Tues and met up with a couple others. We headed out on the 7 hours jaunt and got to the Hokitika campground just after midnight. One thing kayakers rarely complain about is rain, I did that night as I set up my tent while it was pouring.

Wednesday I got up and we made a food run. Baked beans, toast and eggs for brekkie, a kiwi staple. I hadn't had it before and it wasn't too bad although I don't think it will become a Craig staple. We started the day on the Totara river. It was low, even with the rain, but a fun little warm up as I hadn't been in whitewater for a couple months. This run was a bit disappointing as the water was tannic and unlike all I had seen from this area. We had some trouble finding the farm house which doubled as the take out but made it no worries. It was interesting to walk out from the river on the farmers trail, unhook his electric fence and drive away. Another check in the box of things I hadn't done before. After that we split into two groups and each paddled parts of the Kākāpōtahi, don't ask me to pronounce it either. Anyway the top bit was steep and harder so I went that-away. The river went through a couple little box canyons with mossy wet cliffs rising 40-50 meters on either side. This made scouting hard and portaging harder. We had one guy who ran it before but didn't know all the lines. We had a crew of 5 strong paddlers and worked our way down. It was a long succession of waterfalls and slides with the coolest part being a waterfall and runout where you had to drop over another waterfall into a cave and then drop another waterfall out of the cave. It was sweet and a little nerve racking. Everyone made it down all good.


Upper Section


Fun Rapid

The bottom section was much easier and a fun grade III-IV river. We enjoyed more narrow gorge walls in several areas with more open dense rainforest when they flattened out a bit. It felt like paddling through the amazon. The walkout again was a farmer's field to a dirt road which likely doesn't see much traffic.


Typical Lower

Thursday we decided on the NZ famous shuttle, a helicopter flight into the river and paddle out. We ran the Aruhura which is touted as the west coast classic river. The water was glacial blue and chilly. There was little time for rest as the river just drops continuously for about 6 hours worth of paddling. It was an awesome experience and super fun. The major concern for me was the water leaking into my boat. Apparently I had cracked the kayak the day before on the rocky Totara. A little duct tape later and I was good to go, kinda.


Pimp Ride


Top of Arahura


Classic Arahura

Friday most people were in chill mode. I was keen to paddle more because I won't be living or paddling in NZ again and they can whenever they like. Most rivers were a bit low so we headed back to the lower Kākāpōtahi which was lower than before but fun anyway.


Lower Section at Low Water

Saturday I decided to run the Whitcombe River with a couple of guys from Australia who were on a paddling holiday. A quick lift to the top and proceeded down a bigger river than the others earlier in the week. Unfortunately, I had flipped into a rock and took a short swim. My boat on the other hand took a much longer one. It finally got corralled in an eddy downstream on the opposite side of the river to me. The Aussies were quick and helpful in the recovery and the boat was returned to me with some more "cosmetic" damage. Another crack and a nice dent. I resorted myself out and finished the run all good.


Whitcombe

The next day was a long boring haul home and unpacking to get ready for the last few days of work.

Swimming with Hector!

While Craig was enjoying the west coast rivers (as you will read in the next blog), I was enjoying the east coast ocean. Lexie and I decided to road trip up to Akaroa, a small ocean town on the Banks Peninsula, just east of Christchurch to go swimming with the dolphins! The ride there was pretty uneventful in our flash little rental car. We got to the town after driving up and over the hills on some crazy windy roads. Upon checking into our hostel, we realized I had accidentally booked a “double” room instead of a “twin” room, thinking a double would have 2 beds. Unfortunately, there was only one tiny double bed, crammed into one tiny room. Nice and cozy!


Akaroa

We spent the rest of the day and evening wandering around town, checking out the shops, eating ice cream, and having a drink and dinner outside in the sunshine. The next morning, we left the hostel and again wandered the town, stopping for coffee and a nice breakfast before checking in for our dolphin swim. It was a chilly morning so we were happy to be issued our very attractive 7mm wetsuits and booties. We geared up and boarded our tiny little boat with 7 other people. Our captain drove us out into the harbour, toward the ocean for about 20 minutes before spotting our first dolphins. Unfortunately, the little guys were uninterested in us so we sped off to find another group. We came upon a group of 5 dolphins and stopped the boat to watch for a bit. These ones showed a “positive sign” that they were interested so we all hopped into the freezing harbour waters. We spent 45 minutes in the water with the dolphins, whose numbers increased to about 25! They were swimming and jumping around us the whole time, really cool! We kept them entertained by clapping, banging stones together, and singing through our snorkels under the water.


Hector's Dolphin
(picture from doc website)

45 minutes is the maximum amount of time people are allowed to stay in the water with these dophins, so we climbed back on board. This was just as well since most of us could no longer feel our feet at that point! We shivered on the boat with some hot chocolate, watching the dolphins play awhile longer, and then headed back to the dock for hot showers.

This whole experience was really amazing! The dolphins we swam with were Hector's dolphins which are endangered and only found off of New Zealand. There are only about 4000 of them in existence and we were lucky enough to swim with 25 or so of them (a pretty rare number, according to our guide). These dolphins are smaller and have really pretty black and grey coloring. We weren’t allowed to touch them but being so close was good enough for me!

After that, Lex and I drove into Christchurch and spent the rest of the evening wandering into every single souvenir shop. Then we sat outside with a beer, where a bird pooped on my fleece. Craig called to say our credit card had gone on a shopping spree without us and he had to close our account. So, Lexie had to pick up the tab for the rest of the weekend! Our luck improved a couple minutes later though. We were walking down the street and ran into an American couple we had met the week before on the Milford Track! We had hung out with them in all of the huts and then went our separate ways when the tramp was over. They were only in the city for a few hours so it was really random to see them! We ended up going for dessert and a couple of drinks with them to end our night.

Next morning was a tasty brekkie at our favourite place, Drexel’s, more shopping, a cycle race, dragon boat races, and a glimpse of the Santa Parade before heading back to Dunedin. Oh, and I can’t forget our stop at Cookie Time!


Dragon Boat Race

A few more pics

I made it home just after Craig and we spent the rest of the night swapping stories. This past weekend was drinks at the Dean’s house, graduation, dinner at a co-worker’s, and initiation of packing, throwing away, and selling. Now, we’re finishing up our last week of work and getting ready for several farewell parties and one last trip to the west coast over Christmas. This may be our last update before heading back to the US so have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and we will see most of you soon!

The Great Milford Track

Milford Track is one of the Great Walks in New Zealand and has been described as “the finest walk in the world.” So, of course we had to squeeze it in before we left! It is a 4 day, 53.5 km walk in the beautiful Fiordland National Park. Access to the track is strictly limited and we had to book our hut passes months in advance just to get on it. Luckily, it all worked out and we began our trip on Wednesday with a 3.5 hour drive to Te Anau, where the track begins. We spent the night there, picked up our hut passes in the morning and were off!

To get to the track, we had to take a boat to Glade Wharf at the head of Lake Te Anau. The ride was pretty and we arrived at the wharf about an hour and a half later. Here we set off for the short first leg of our journey. It was only about an hour and a half to Clinton Hut so we took our time enjoying the sights along the way.


Ready to begin!


Day one rest stop

We were the first of 40 to arrive at the hut so we chose our bunks, ate some lunch, and played some Rummy outside in the hot sun, all the while slapping at sandflies. That evening, our hut warden, Russ (who had the longest legs I have ever seen) took us on a little nature walk, pointing out trees, plants and birds. After that, we prepared our Thanksgiving feast of pre-cooked chicken, gravy, instant mashed potatoes, instant stuffing, and bagged wine. It actually ended up being a pretty good substitute for the good stuff, considering we had to carry it all in and were eating in the middle of the forest! We enjoyed the good company of some fellow Americans here on holiday and headed down the trail after dark to see some glow worms. Not a bad Thanksgiving!


Happy Thanksgiving!

Next morning, we were unhappily woken at 5am by some early birds in our bunkroom. This was made worse by the fact that all 3 of us had to get up multiple times during the night to visit the outdoor toilet. Lesson learned: instant taters/stuffing contains LOTS of water, not good when camping. We couldn’t go back to sleep so we ended up getting up and were on the trail by 7am for the 6 hour walk to Mintaro Hut.

Day 2 was rainy but, as with several of our other adventures here, we did not complain as it only made the waterfalls more spectacular. Not to mention that rain is the norm in this little corner of the world. Our hike that day took us through rainforest, across prairies, past lakes, over boulder fields and slip areas, and halfway up the mountain. We saw endangered blue ducks, NZ robins, tui, and lots of other birdlife. We were pretty wet by the time we finished, but not cold. It continued to pour rain at the hut so we alternated staying bundled up inside and sitting outside on the covered porch looking at the pretty surroundings. There was also a weka hanging out on the porch so we made friends with him. Finally, just before sunset (around 10pm now!) the skies began to clear and we saw for the first time just what was around us. We were surprised to find that we were surrounded by towering rock faces with waterfalls tumbling down all over! The moon and stars came out and we stood outside staring and taking pictures until darkness took over.


Sunset at Mintaro Hut

Day 3 was our toughest day, summit day! We took our time in the morning as it was once again overcast and rainy, and was forecasted to clear by midday. We wanted every chance of having clear skies at the summit, MacKinnon Pass. So, we set out around 9:30am and began our ascent. We climbed through rainforest for about 2 hours before transitioning into alpine landscape (tussock, and rocky). From here we switchbacked up, in rain and very chilly winds (90kmph!) to the top where we found Lexie, who had been ahead of us, huddled behind a rock, trying to stay warm.


Almost to the summit in the clouds

It was still very cloudy so no views and we continued on to a shelter just up the trail. There, we had some lunch snacks and peeked outside every now and then to see the sky slowly clearing up. Again, with breaks in the clouds, we were shocked at what we saw! Surrounded by snow-capped mountains and glacier valleys in every direction, we left our packs and went back up the trail for the now clear views. And well worth the wait, it was stunning beauty all around. We spent over an hour just looking and taking pictures (which, by the way, don’t do it justice).


The last of the clouds clear


View from MacKinnon Pass

After awhile, we decided we better get back on the trail as we still had another 4 hours of tramping ahead (including a 1000 metre descent) and a side hike of 1.5 hours to Sutherland Falls. So, we started down the alternate route and the main trail was closed for avalanche danger. This trail was quite steep and rocky so we were glad to have trekking poles to help us down. We eventually made it back into the rainforest and tramped on past numerous creeks, rivers, and waterfalls. By now it was completely clear and sunny, perfect weather!

We got to the Sutherland Falls shelter and dropped our heavy packs for the 45 minute hike to the falls. Our legs were feeling a little wobbly by that point so we were really hoping the falls were worth the extra effort and boy were we rewarded! Sutherland Falls are named after Donald Sutherland, who discovered MacKinnon Pass and, essentially, Milford Track in the late 1800’s. They are the highest falls in NZ, at 580 metres, or 1904 feet. Its source is Lake Quill, which is fed by several surrounding glaciers. There was a huge volume of water coming down into an extremely shallow pool and rocks, just exploding out to the sides. As a result, we were completely soaked in freezing cold snowmelt almost instantly. But it was worth it!


Sutherland Falls

After picking up our packs, we continued down the trail for the last hour of our day. Our legs were feeling pretty wobbly from all the downhill walking so we were pretty happy to see the hut. We again chose our bunks and decided to head back up the trail to the swimming hole. The water was ice cold and was actually painful to be in for more than a few seconds but after a couple of extremely quick dunks in, we were feeling pretty refreshed. We headed back to the hit and prepared our final dinner of the track, soup. We wandered outside to see the mama and baby weka, and to secure our poles and boots to keep the kea from stealing them. It was an early to bed night after an exhausting day. Unfortunately, our whole bunkroom was woken around 1am by 2 serious snorers who continued the noises for the rest of the night. So, again, none of us got much sleep. But, to be expected when you share a room with that many people!

Day 4, our final 6 hours on the track was sunny and clear again! Our legs were again pretty tired but we couldn’t take our time too much as we had a 2pm boat to catch! So, we carried on, stopping to see some cool sights, including Mackay Falls, Bell Rock, Poseidon Creek, and some other pretty rivers and falls. Oh, and of course we were still surrounded by the beautiful mountains!


Mackay Falls


Craig rocking one of many swing bridges, this one over Poseidon Creek


Typical Day 4

We made it, feet aching, to Sandfly Point around 1:15, snapped a few parting shots, took off our boots, and boarded the oldest boat in Milford for the 20 minute ride across the sound. We passed Mitre Peak and Bowen Falls for one last time, and then ended our journey with a bus ride up Milford Road, over the pass, back to Te Anau.


We made it!

We were all craving real food, so we took our stinky, no shower for 4 days selves to the Ranch for some deserved burger, fries, wedges, and nachos before beginning the drive back to Dunedin. We finally arrived home at 9pm, threw in a load of laundry, showered, and hurried to bed to rest up for work the next day. Milford Track was amazing, and we are once again feeling pretty lucky to have had the opportunity to see it!

Milford Pics