So Far in New Zealand

Chad post:

Everything you hike is STEEP!!!  If there is vertical, it's steep.  We hiked Rob Roy and went back to Wanaka to stay the night. 

Chad inspects the bottoms of rocks to see what's hatching.

Chad casts into the 7th fastest flowing river in the world, according to our camp hosts. No fish yet, though!

Lake Wanaka

Kristie's Standard Breakfast out of the Jucy Van

The next day we stayed in town to do shopping and gather supplies so we did a little town hike called Mount Iron.  It was pretty cake, 2.5 to 3 mile loop and probably only gained 500 foot in elevation, but what I'm finding out is it is either flat walking or big steps up and down.   So even the "easy town hike" was pretty steep.

Mount Iron overlooking Wanaka

After our hike we went to the main street of Wanaka to get a few things.  Groceries, Gas and a Jetboil Java Coffee press that was lost while customs searched our luggage.  After getting our goodies (the coffee press the next morning) we went to the DOC (Department of Conservation) to make a game plan, we found a trek to an overnight hut an hour north of Wanaka.  It is a four bunk hut, with mattress and heater.  The DOC says 7 KM each way - 5 hour walk - and no one really goes there!!!  Sweet!!!!

Let me tell you why no one goes there...after the first half mile of relatively flat hiking, it gets steep and narrow and steeper and narrower and then you're not even one mile in and you pretty much have only gained 1/6 of the vertical you need to get to the hut....and every step you feel like you might fall to your death...we turned around and that 1/2 mile going back to the flats was even scarier going down.  

Chad makes his way up the mountain as the trail diminishes and skirts closer to the edge.

Fantail watches as we make our way up the hill.

Turning back. This was the easy part....

 But Kristie and I made it down safely and alive....Boom

After that we stuck to waterfall walks off the side of the road and the Haast Pass overlook, which if you had to guess how the trek was....well...it was very short but steep as shit!!!  The drive down from Wanaka to Haast was incredible....

Haast Pass Overlook

Cairns left in homage to the waterfall by visitors past.

Some things are not what they seem. Can you tell what is illusory in this photo?

Kristie leaves a cairn of her own as tribute.

Walking barefoot through the cairn fields while sand flies bite our ankles!

Unmarked waterfall and pools off the side of the Haast Highway, where Chad stopped to fish.

Seems like water falls out of every mountain here. Even still, Kristie snaps away.