Fiordland National Park

Just got back from a “tramping” trip in Fjordland National Park.  It’s Tramping Club’s biggest event of the year and this year they were able to take about seventy people.  When over one hundred people show up to try to get on a trip, obviously some have to be turned down.  This is why I volunteered to pass on a more difficult trip option and co-lead an easier trip just to ensure I got a spot (and it never hurts to put “New Zealand Tramping Club Trip Leader” on a resume ;) ).  However, being a trip leader for this club is far different from being a trip leader for DU’s Alpine Club and I’m not necessarily sure it’s worth it.  I’ll elaborate on this in my next post, but for now I’ll tell you about the amazing time we had in Fjordland.

Friday evening we piled into one large bus and several different vans, depending on where each group’s starting point was.  There were about eleven different groups doing different routes at different skill levels.  After about a five hour drive sitting next to the most incessantly chatty person I’ve ever met, we made it to The Divide at the base of the famous Routeburn Track around 11:30 pm. The fifty of us left in the bus spilled out and slept on the concrete pad of the trail head shelter for the night.

The next morning my group woke at a decent hour. I tried muesli for the first time, which is delicious hot oat-like granola, and I got my group doing some goofy stretching before hitting the track.  I was co-leading the trip with an adorable Kiwi girl who slightly reminds me of a beautiful Who from Whoville (Dr. Seuss’s “The Grinch”).  It was her first time as trip leader but knew the terrain pretty well.  I have led trips before and knew a lot about setting up rain flies, tying knots, first aid, etc., and so we made a good team.  It was serendipitous that there were two of us too because Meghann had a sprained ankle and had to take it pretty slow.  She’s a trooper though, honestly.  I never could have pushed through the nine hours of hiking she did that weekend on a sprained ankle.  I kept pace with her while Laura led our four other people on at a higher speed.

 

The track was very well maintained and led us through beautiful scenery of dense forest, rainfalls, and open vistas looking out over Fjordland.  We followed it back to Lake Mackenzie, an emerald green pool nestled between two ridges and a peak.  We bush wacked our way around the lake and into a stand of dense brush between the glacier creek and a ridge face.  Laura and I left the group to go scout for a hidden place to set up camp (as it may or may not have been legal to camp there).  I found a lovely little moss-covered dell that made for a perfect shelter from the storm expected that night where there was enough space for all of us to bed down on the soft moss and leave a space for cooking.  (This is where my Boy Scout-for-life Dad’s lessons come into play).  I set up the fly perfectly to shield us from the oncoming wind and rain and at an angle that would prevent pooling and drain the runoff away from our sleeping site.  (I know, I’m a dork, but I’m so proud of myself.)  We spent the rest of the evening gorging on burritos, Tim Tam Slams (hot tea sucked up through chocolate wafer cookies as they melt into delicious gooiness) and competing for the last Tim Tam cookies with card games.

  

 

Four am wake-up call and still the storm had luckily not hit us.  We dawned our headlamps, packed up camp and made slow progress to the Lake Mackenzie Hut.  Meghann was in bad shape at this point but a few little gift capsules from one of our group members dulled the pain.  There was no way she would make it up and over the ridge and down the Deadman’s track (extremely steep three hour descent, hence the name) to complete the loop we had started.  So, her and I waved goodbye to our group and took off the way we had come.  It was pretty slow going until she took a second pill.  The cumulative effect of two pain pills made her a very happy high-speed walker.  (Pardon the ‘high’ pun.)  We had a great old time just the two of us and I was not in the least bit unhappy at missing a three hour descent- something my knees would have been killing me for.  Additionally, where Saturday it had been sunny and beautiful, Sunday was rainy.  Fjordland is amazing in both types of weather for very different reasons.  The sun is wonderful but, being a rainforest, waterfalls appear everywhere when it rains.  It was a treat to see the transformation of the track we had done the day prior into a different type of wonderland.  We made it back to The Divide, dried off, changed, and, since we were nearly four hours early, laid out our sleeping bags for a nice long nap.

I woke to the chatter of strangers that had finished the track and were awaiting their own rides home.  They probably thought we were bums.  At this point I’ve slept on random beaches, on park benches, in people’s yards, on the side of the road, in the front seats of cars, in the back of vans, under tarps, over tarps, in a tent, in a bivy under the stars, and on people’s couches.  Sleeping on a cement slab under a four-pillared roof in the middle of nowhere fits right into my life.  Let them think what they will. 

Eventually everyone else arrived, people loaded the bus and the rest of us packed into the vans.  It was a great ride home full of fun and laughs.  At one point, we missed a turn to a shortcut, backed into a ditch, and probably didn’t shave any time off when we had to get out of the van and push nor when we pulled over to pick mushrooms from the side of the road.   

Home safe and sound after a wonderful trip.  Later in the week my group all got together to make home made pizzas, exchange pictures, and recall all of the fun we had.  It was really a great group and some of the nicest and down to earth people I’ve met in New Zealand so far.  I hope we all stay in touch for more outdoor antics. 

*Many of these photos were taken by other people.