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| Arthur River crossing |
Four
Go Over Mackinnon Pass
Or,
Walking
the Milford Track
Ethan Tucker
27 November 2005
14
November (Wellington – Te Anau)
After being
advised to catch and eat keas on my Fiordland excursion by a chatty Maori
shuttle driver[1], I flew down
to Christchurch, then transferred to an ATR-72 for the next flight into
Queenstown. My pack was laden with
snack bars and noodles for the walk, plus a coveted ingot of Cadbury’s Fruit
& Nut to keep us going. The journey
into Queenstown takes passengers barrelling through the Kawarau Gorge, buzzing
below the valley peaks and providing a great view of both the twisting river below
and the Remarkables to the south.
Taking care
to avoid the family of ducks in the carpark, another shuttle whisked me into
the bustling touristy overload of central Queenstown. I didn’t have to stay long though, because a Tracknet van soon carried me
on southwards towards Te Anau. Onboard
were a cheery young local driver chap, a quiet newcomer who turned out to be a
new driver joining the company, and a middle-aged lady from Te Anau who was
just returning from a month in the mountains of Nepal. Passing the home of the Kingston Flyer, we paused to change
drivers at Five Rivers, then turned westwards on Highway 94 to Te Anau via the
sleepy hamlet of Mossburn, whose major source of revenue is its speed camera.
Tom met me
at the drop-off point in the rented Daewoo, and we drove to meet Liz and fellow
Queensland mate Alison at a nearby lakeview pub for a quick drink before a
frankly enormous dinner at a local Italian restaurant, followed by an early
night at the hostel.
15
November (Te Anau – Clinton Hut)
After a
morning spent eating as much as possible and buying as much food as we could stuff
into our packs, we adjourned to Bev’s
to hire some gear for Liz and Alison.
While we were there, an American couple returned from their tramp, extolling
the wonders of the Milford Track. We
exchanged a heavy pineapple that I had brought down from Wellington for a pack
of nuts and raisins that they had taken along but not delved into. Along with sturdy packs and stylish waterproofs,
Bev decked the girls out with swish walking
poles, which made them look far more puissant than stick-less Tom and me. What with Liz and Alison’s red and yellow
fleeces, and Tom and my blue coats, a passing child might have confused us with
a waterproof version of The Wiggles.
Another
shuttle-bus collected us from the Te Anau DoC
centre to deliver us 20km north along the lakeshore to the jetty at Te Anau
Downs. The quixotic driver was heard to
mutter at one point ‘I need to get gas’, at which point he turned the bus
around and drove it in a circuit through the outskirts of Te Anau, only to
return to Highway 94 and continue on northwards. This did not inspire confidence, but the bus made it without
sputtering into inaction.
The
catamaran trip to the northernmost point of the lake took about an hour, and
the grey-skied chill encouraged us to stay inside the cabin and size up our
fellow walkers. Half were independent
trampers like us, who would be staying at the DoC huts and carrying all their
own food on their backs. The others
were Milford
Track Guided Walkers, who we quickly dubbed ‘the richies’. Guided walkers pay about five times as much
as independent trampers, which allows them to stay in a fair approximation of
luxury. As we set off from the start of
the track, our packs heavy with supplies, we passed their first accommodation
spot, Glade House. As we strode by,
pitchers of orange juice sat on bedside tables awaiting their pampered guests,
and a guide explained to a well-groomed customer that each suite contained an
ensuite bathroom. Now that’s roughing
it!
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| Clinton Hut |
After a
pre-dinner wander along the stony banks of the Clinton River, we braved the
flies to sit outside the huts, where we chatted to young Tara, the DoC ranger
in sole charge of the 40-strong hut contingent. Not long out of school, Tara spoke with the traditional Southland
burr while waving a stuffed stoat that had foolishly wandered into a nearby trap
and had been immortalised as a pest totem.
Up close, its bristly whiskers and curling lip revealing pointy incisors
resembled a peevish and far less dapper Basil Brush.
Stumbling
around by torchlight in pitch-dark bunkrooms, we retired for the night, eagerly
awaiting our first full day of tramping on the following day. For a while the only noise was a puzzling
waspish drone in the distance. It turns
out to be the massed ranks of trampers’ battery-operated toothbrushes. All the comforts of home, if only you can be
bothered to carry them. As the
temperature dropped and the skies opened, the hut’s plastic roof drummed to the
constant beat of pounding rain until early morning, drowning out the snores of
our bunkmates and eventually lulling us to sleep.
16
November (Clinton Hut – Mintaro Hut)
We set out
on the next leg of the track at 8.15am on a mild grey-sky morning. Occasionally bright bursts of mountain
sunshine would break through to illuminate the foliage and enliven the flowing
river. For the first two kilometres,
the Clinton had turned from a glass-like clarity to a dirty brown overnight,
probably because of a heavy landslide on the uninhabited North Branch of the
river during the heavy rain.
We passed
the lofty Hirere Falls on our left, tumbling down from the valley heights over
near-vertical moss-clad cliffs. A tiny
robin perched precariously on a vertical branch to examine us as we passed,
completely unafraid. As the valley
opened out we paused for photographs and admired the grand vista, then took a
side-trip to Hidden Lake to observe its alpine wetland environs from a
vegetation-protecting boardwalk. Around
mid-morning we also happened upon a family of alpine ducks busily paddling
around a sheltered lagoon.
Detouring to the valley walls, we enjoyed the crisp air around little Prairie Lake, with a high waterfall churning and replenishing its waters. Shortly after returning to the track, we entered the avalanche-prone area of the valley, where DoC signs warned trampers not to dally in case of rockfalls. Scattered moss-free boulders testified that avalanches were common. Tom and I, leading the pack, were lucky enough to see two snow avalanches high above, the noise of which resounded across the valley, reminding us of the warning signs’ accuracy.
Around 1pm
we stopped for lunch near Bus Stop Shelter, a doorless bare tin shack. Its dank interior didn’t impress, so we
adjourned to the stony riverbanks for our lunch. We were soon joined by a persistent kea that makes the hut his
home. He eagerly hunted around the
fringes of our peripheral vision, hoping for a discarded scrap of food, or a
chance to make off with an unguarded bread roll. Some keas have been known to hook their beaks through unattended
backpack zippers to gain access to the morsels within, but this one kept a
respectful distance from the girls’ hiking sticks, experience having afforded
him rare avian wisdom.
Four German
trampers, a.k.a. Das Lads, strode
past purposefully, hoping to reach the hut before everyone else. They approached track attire somewhat
differently to the rest of us, it must be said. They showed they were really
serious about burning through the kilometres by carrying two walking poles,
one for each hand. Presumably they each
also carried a six-pack of beer (!), because they often relished a can in the
huts at night. At least 20 percent of
their packs must have been occupied by hair products, as one lad regularly
sported a Yahoo Serious-style
quiff. Another did the whole track
wearing denim jeans.[3]
Setting off
again, we tramped through profuse forests with branches drooping under the
weight of bulky moss jackets. Light
smatterings of rain cooled the air as we crested a series of rises that led us
to our second night’s stop, Mintaro Hut, a walk of some 16.5km from Clinton
Hut. Unlike Clinton, Mintaro Hut
accommodates its trampers in a single building. We found ourselves beds in the roomy attic bunk-space, then
ambled downstairs to sit by the fire.
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| Mintaro Hut |
As the
hut’s rainwater tank bubbled over, full to the brim, the perky ranger girl
warned us not to leave our boots on the ground outside the hut: keas love
nothing more than to sharpen their beaks on leather, and many a tramper has
emerged to find a stylish pair of boots shredded in the morning. Rows of boot-pegs high on the walls were
fitted with metal over-screens to prevent keas landing on them and attacking
the invaders’ footwear.
To pass the
time before dinner I strolled to visit little Lake Mintaro, its banks gently
merging into the grass and its surface dappled with raindrops. A black shag, interrupted in its task of
hunting small fish, flapped away through the drizzle, flying towards the
looming Mackinnon Pass that jutted high above the Hut just to the north. As I walked back to the huts the rain set in
for the night, turning to snow on the peaks in the small hours.
17
November (Mintaro Hut – Dumpling Hut)
The hardest
day of the track, and not only because our repose was rent asunder by grievous
common-room snoring bouts. A steep 500m
climb from the valley floor up over Mackinnon Pass was followed by a long
drawn-out 900m descent over the other side down Roaring Burn and the Arthur
River valley. The ranger (who had
illustrated the magnitude of the descent by repeating the word ‘down’ fifteen
times in a row) warned all trampers to dress warmly for the Pass, where the
alpine air is forced over flinty rocks and mountain tarns. Fortuitously, the Pass was clear with only
tiny scatterings of snow – frequently the crossing is overcast and
view-less. We headed out onto the track
again and were soon picking our way up the steep switchback inclines.
Having
eaten several meals from our supplies, the load we had to carry had lessened,
but it was still hard work to trudge up the path’s heavy stones. As we made progress the rainforest cover
ebbed away, exposing us to the cutting breeze, but the exercise protected us
from chill. Pretty white mountain
buttercups clung to the trackside, spreading slick round leaves to catch the
drizzle. I was surprised to find the
climb easier than I had feared. In the
end, I put it down to the mystical life-giving powers of that traditional New
Zealand tonic, Raro.
Two hours
after leaving the hut we arrived at the Pass, and savoured the glorious views
down both the Clinton and the Arthur valleys.
A stone cairn with a cross, erected in 1912, provides a memorial for
Quintin Mackinnon (1853-92), the Scottish explorer who was the first guide on
the track. A family of keas prowled the
skies, hoping for an unattended packed lunch while trampers have their picture
taken in front of the precipice known (for obvious reasons) as ‘12 Second
Drop’. Tom went patrolling for photos,
but hurried back when one of the birds tried to sneak into his pack, despite
Liz clapping her hands to shoo it. Perhaps
the persistent kea thought it was a round of applause for its impressive
burglary attempt. ‘Thank you, thank you
– and now, for my encore…’
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| At 12-Second Drop |
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| Keas on the Mackinnon Memorial |
Breaking
into the precious supply of chocolate to provide a burst of energy, we pressed
on across the Pass, pausing for photos at the highest point (1164m). Flecks of snow drifted through the air and
settled in the tussock while the wan cloud-dodging sun shone down on us. An annoyingly perky Guided Walk guide in a
red fleece legged it past us, to make sure she got to the Pass Hut in time to
clean its famous lavatory, lest the richies have to use a smelly longdrop
(!). The toilet in question is known
(in a rather twee way) as ‘the loo with the view’, because its Perspex window
commands a brilliant vista of the whole Clinton Valley.
Edging left
around Mt Balloon (1853m), I filled my bottle from an ice-cold waterfall that
gushed down the stony side of the mountain and across the track to the valley
below, and we eased down towards Roaring Burn.
Maori travellers called this choppy stream Te Horo-o-Nuku (Nuku’s
Avalanche), and DoC signs warn of similar dangers today, with trampers urged
not to stop on the track. The Jervois
Glacier on Mt Elliott above regularly disgorges rock and snow avalanches that litter
the track with a jumble of boulders and scree.
The
avalanche zone safely negotiated, we set out upon what turned out to be the
hardest portion of the track – the long series of declining switchbacks down
the north side of Roaring Burn. The
track is well-maintained but the large rocks require careful concentration and
real effort to successfully navigate, particularly given the light coating of
rain that had slickened the surface. As
we descended, the path returned into bush cover and twisted past a series of
grand waterfalls, pounding their way through the hardy stone valley.
Emerging
ahead of the girls at the Guided Walk ‘hut’[4],
Tom and I chatted to a worried-looking middle-aged American chap, who was
fretting over the loan of his expensive walking pole to one of a pair of
English girls on the track (Nadine and Debs from Southampton). One had broken her rented pole and was
finding the Roaring Burn descent particularly challenging, so he kindly lent
her one of his. But he had forgotten to
ask her name, and now his powers of description seemed to have deserted him. It was hard to keep a straight face when the
best adjective he could come up to describe her was ‘heavy-set’ (because she
was in no way heavy-set at all; in fact, if anyone could have been described as
heavy-set it would have been the aforementioned Generous Benefactor).
Liz and Alison emerged from the track, and as we all rested on the grass and ate some
lunch (somewhat worse for wear) the sandflies swarmed and fought for stationary
skin space. Shedding our packs for an
hour or so, Tom, Liz and I took a side-trail for an hour to see the grand
spectacle of Sutherland
Falls, which at 580m high are the highest in New Zealand and the 6th-highest
in the world. The weight of water
smashing down its massive leaps left the air around its lake saturated with
spray.
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| Sutherland Falls |
Returning
down to pick up our packs we came across a pale Debs, who had previously been
determined to see the falls but was now swooning from a lack of blood
sugar. Extending a measure of guarded
sympathy, we offered her some of our chocolate to perk her up, and told her the
falls were only a short level stroll away.
Later we found she’d not even made it to the falls (which were really about
200m away), and had even required another cadged sugar dose to trudge back to the
huts. Poor lamb. We pictured a DoC helicopter flying
overhead, winching down a barley sugar to save Debs from death’s door.
Setting off
down the trail once more, it was with a great sense of relief that we finally
arrived at Dumpling Hut, our home for the night. We had travelled 14km and taken a rather long time about it. Once the packs were removed we found it hard
to move fast enough to evade the sandfly packs, particularly as our aching
calves imparted a geriatric gait.
The hut’s
ranger, Venerable Ross, was a beanpole fellow of about 60, who had been working
the DoC huts for 12 years. His
elongated legs stretched forth from sturdy no-nonsense workshorts, and were
punctuated by prominent mountaineers’ knees.
A sensible sort, he frowned mildly at the unknown galoot who had started
a fire in the hut’s pot-belly stove despite the mild evening temperature, which
quickly transformed the cookhouse into a Finnish-style sauna. Almost as good as a hot shower, I
suppose. The cheery Germans in the corner
enjoyed themselves by crushing beer-cans underfoot. We gave some spare noodles to the English girls, so Tom had to go
without seconds. Such is the price of
Christian generosity.
Before long
we collapsed into our sleeping bags for the night. So ended a day of hard work and splendid sights.
18
November (Dumpling Hut – Milford Sound)
The last
day’s tramp was 18km downhill on mostly level track to Sandfly Point. Wary of being left behind by the ferry, Liz
& Alison got up at dawn’s light and set off at 7.15am to get a good
head-start. Tom and I breakfasted on
cereal and powdered milk, and set off around 45 minutes later. The day had turned out fine and still, with
sunshine peeping through the bush canopy and illuminating the valley floor, and
tendrils of mist caressing the mountain peaks.
We passed a massive landslip that had obliterated the track, in which
the hillside had disgorged a slew of loose stones a hundred metres wide to
sweep down to the Arthur River. Apparently
this section of the track has plenty of avalanche paths, with names like Coby
and Bossy, after former track packhorses.
We crossed
the Arthur on a bouncing suspension bridge, and stopped to marvel at the
glacial stillness of the water’s surface, its mirror-like surface perfectly reflecting
the clouds and sky above. Shortly
afterwards we rested at the beautiful Mackay Falls, which tumbled over stones
lush with dark moss, and squeezed into nearby Bell Rock – despite its narrow
entrance, two people can stand up inside it (as long as you don’t imagine wetas
are in there with you). We ambled
easily alongside the 900 year-old Lake Ada, which was formed when a large
rockslide blocked off the river. Later
we joined up with Liz and Alison, and heard that they had offered more food
to the English girls (bless ‘em).
Apparently on receiving a mandarin from Liz, Nadine had held it out to a
passing German and exclaimed, ‘look, fresh foooood!’ Well, yes.
Soon enough
we emerged from the track, footsore but elated to have finally reached the end
of our journey, the aptly-named Sandfly Point.
A stone cairn marks the end of the track, 53.5km from Lake Te Anau, and
some weary travellers have anointed it with the trophies of their success by
tying their tramping boots to it. We
took a celebratory picture in front of it. As the ferry arrived to take us over
the Sound to Milford and much-anticipated hot showers, we also took a
commemorative picture of the well-travelled 750g pack of nuts and raisins, which
had loitered in my pack but not been eaten.
It had now done the Milford Track twice as many times as we had.
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| They Came To Sandfly Point |
19
November (Milford Sound – Queenstown)
Hot
showers! Cooked food! Extremely slow internet connections! Ah, the glorious trappings of modern
society. Refreshed by a good night’s
sleep in comfortable beds at the Milford Lodge, we walked
2km along the Milford Road to the dock, where we boarded the Milford Monarch[5]
for a morning cruise on the Sound (which was included
in our track package, along with the transfers to and from Te Anau). Just to prove that life was perfect, the
cruise included hot croissants, orange juice, fruit and cereal, which we
feasted on as the catamaran cruised out.
The 9am cruise is obviously the one to go on, because there were only
about half a dozen other people on the vessel.
Invigorated
by the scenery, we bid farewell to Milford and boarded our coach back to Te
Anau via the Homer Tunnel. As we passed
back into the real world, the springtime fields of Southland sported massed
ranks of multicoloured lupins and gorse, dazzling the eye. Collecting the rental car, we sped up to
Queenstown for the night, arriving in time for a drink on the waterfront and a
tasty meal in an Indian restaurant.
20
November (Queenstown – Wellington)
There’s a
first time for everything, and in Queenstown it was my first try of McDonalds’
pancakes for breakfast. They turned out
quite likeable; almost like real food in fact.
Seeking a good view, we took the town’s gondola up to the viewing
platforms, and took in the vistas of the sprawling town and Lake Wakatipu.
As the
others were travelling on to the West Coast, they kindly dropped me at Wanaka
airfield for my flight back home. We
took the scenic route through the Cardrona Valley, driving past the famous bra fence en route.
Bidding my
glacier-seeking Australian chums farewell, I took an extremely bumpy Beech 1900
flight back to Christchurch – the sort in which you try to brace your feet
against the bulkhead or nearby passengers.
This was followed by a lurching 737 trip back into Wellington,
accompanied only by a long-serving backpack full of dirty clothes and a keen
sense of achievement and good fortune at having witnessed the manifold wonders
of the beautiful Milford Track.
[1] A bit
chewy, I would’ve thought.
[2] In fact,
the sandflies seem to take a hand-wave as less of a signal to go away, and more
of a signal that you’re presenting your hand to be bitten.
[3] At which
provocation ‘serious trampers’ (i.e. not us) would probably mutter darkly under
their breaths and plan their next walk in Antarctica, ‘to avoid the tourists’.
[4] Which
resembled a posh 2-storeyed ski lodge in the middle of the wilderness. With an airstrip.
[5] Yes,
everything here has ‘Milford’ in the title.
1 comment:
Thanks Ethan, nice read.
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