New Boots in New Zealand Nine Great Walks, Three Islands and One Tramping Virgin by Gillian Orrell

Author:Gillian Orrell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Travel/Australia & Oceania
ISBN: 9780908988990
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant
Published: 2009-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Day three: The easy way out

Eight hours later I stop shivering and get up. I don’t recall sleeping at any point during the night. Slow thawing and weighty tiredness add yet more time to my morning routine, so that I’m the only tramper left when a helicopter lands seemingly on the roof.

When the noise stops I venture outside and find two men drinking tea with the ‘warden’.

‘Morning.’

‘Morning.’

‘Are you giving him a lift out?’ I ask, indicating pikelet man.

‘No. We’ve been up tracking tahr. They’ve got radio transmitters attached to them. We’ve been out for two hours and thought we’d stop in for a cup of tea before the next circuit.’

‘I have to walk out,’ adds the warden. ‘We all do. Choppers pick up the rubbish, but we don’t get a ride.’

‘Are you going up the saddle today?’ asks one of the hunters.

‘No. I’ve come the other way.’ With a smile, I use the now familiar tramping lingo. ‘I’m walking out today.’

I am dying to stay in the company of these men, who spend their days working in some of the world’s greatest remaining wilderness. All three of them look tough and hardy, but none of them has the cowboy swagger that says they know it. I can tell, however, that although they have been polite, our conversation has just ended. Here, at least, are three people who have no intention of asking me where I’m from or how long I’m in New Zealand for.

I leave them to their tea and tall tales.

By the time I’m back on the track it is just past 10.00am and I am slightly concerned that I may not finish in time to meet Wattie at 1.45pm. No dawdling, stopping or side trips for me today.

Fortunately the route is a gradual downhill under a shady canopy. The sun dazzles in yet another clear sky above and makes me want to turn around and try another assault on Conical Hill. Too late, too tired.

I find a piece of local vandalism at Israeli Creek. Here, one of DOC’s handy wooden footbridges crosses the tumbling waterfall–stream. The creek is named after an Israeli couple who apparently decided to deviate from the Routeburn Track. Their aim, I believe, was to cross from Lake Mackenzie over Emily Peak into the Routeburn valley – probably to try something different from the masses, to get their own views of the mountains and to cut a few kilometres off the route. Now, I’m not in favour of people crashing off-track in this otherwise undisturbed wilderness. Hut wardens and hunters earn the right to do so, but are few in number and DOC wisely discourages anyone else from doing so. I have been quite pleased to learn, therefore, that this particular couple became hopelessly lost.

They eventually found a waterfall and surmised that the water may have found a route down into the valley that they could follow. This worked up to a point – and they ended up huddled together on that point, as darkness and water fell around them.

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