Bushwalk Australia

by **bigkev** » Sat 24 Jan, 2015 7:49 pm

I've just come back from five weeks tramping on the South Island of New Zealand. Most of the walks I did may be considered a bit soft for some of the punters on the forum but the North West Circuit may appeal to a few.

First up let me say that NZ is awesome, the country is stunning and the people are some of nicest I've met in my travels. Every time I'm over there I fall in love with the place again.

I did the NWC over 10 days which made for a fairly relaxed tramp, most days I was finished walking by early afternoon, which left the rest of the day to clean and dry my boots and generally kick back and enjoy the superb huts. The tramp is famous for its mud among other things, and the mud was indeed plentiful and deep. Every time I figured that it couldn't get worse it did. Descending to Little Hellfire Beach there was one spot about a metre deep, other sections were like climbing up a steep river of mud, it amazed me how deep the mud could get on a near vertical slope. Apart from the mud, Sandflies were probably the biggest hurdle, they certainly like the taste of my blood.

I hope all that doesn't sound too negative because I was actually loving the adventure of it. In between the mud climbs the route would break out onto stunningly wild beaches where I saw seals, penguins and plenty of native birds. Once back in the bush there was beautiful streams and rivers as well as the native birds, including 6 kiwi sightings, sweet hey!

I've written up one of my crazy guy journals which has a day by day account of the tramp with around 230 photos spread through it if anyone wants to see more detail. Here's the link http://hiking.topicwise.com/doc/Stewartisland

I've posted a few photos to give a bit of a taster for what the track is all about.

: The Southern Alps across the Foveaux Strait from Lucky Beach.

: East Ruggedy Beach.

: West Ruggedy Beach.

: Waituna Beach.

: Another one from Waituna Beach.

by **wayno** » Sun 25 Jan, 2015 3:01 am

this summer the weather has been generally pretty mild dry weather in between the normal rain storms and dumps of snow.. as i write this i'm stuck working in christchurch before having to fly back to auckland dammit :cry:

by **ofuros** » Sun 25 Jan, 2015 6:03 am

Tasty !......lovely shots.

by **bigkev** » Sun 25 Jan, 2015 9:49 pm

Hi Guys,

Thanks for checking out my post.

I got really lucky with the weather Wayno, flying into Invercargill at the end of November it was coming down sideways and the locals were all walking around in sheep skin jandals muttering about how cold it was. However from the minute I set foot on Stewart Island the weather improved markedly, I only had two days of crappy weather on the NWC.

Cheers
Kevin

by **Canberra Trekker** » Tue 03 Feb, 2015 7:03 pm

I did the NW circuit and the southern circuit in Feb 2014. I second the amount of mud on the track. Enjoyed reading the blog. I arranged for the water taxi to drop some supplies at freshwater landing. I did the NW circuit from Oban in anti clock direction and timed the supply drop at Freshwater with our arrival there. Then we did the southern circuit crossing the Tolson River swamp Freds camp and Rakehua, Doughboy Mason Bay and back to Freshwater. Then we were one of those who skip the Thompson Ridge section by catching water taxi out from Freshwater. All up it took 14 days. Could be done faster as we did not skip any of the huts. Met some people who were double hutting at every opportunity. Weather was mostly fine. Only light drizzle on couple of days. Saw several deer and kiwis although camera is usually not ready when they are seen. I am supprised that the deer at Freshwater is still there. We saw it in Feb and have photo of it taken through hut window. We met a number of hunters on southern circuit so I was thinking that the Freshwater deer would be easy prey for a hunter.Cannot get over how nice the huts are and so cheap.

by **bigkev** » Fri 06 Feb, 2015 7:50 pm

I don't really understand why people would make all the effort to get to Stewart Island and then rush through the walk double hutting, but each to their own I suppose. Sounds like you had an awesome adventure CT I'd like to do the Southern Circuit someday, it might have to wait till I retire though. I can't believe bambi is still there either as a hunter could have easily taken her out from the annex of the hut. Thomson Ridge to North Arm was a good day, but the following day along the Great Walk was so so (maybe I was just looking forward to the pub!).

Cheers
Kevin

by **Canberra Trekker** » Wed 11 Feb, 2015 7:39 pm

We met a woman at Rakeahua hut who had 2 days earlier walked from Big Hellfire hut to Doughboy hut. Her plan had been to walk from Hellfire to Mason bay but found that hut was full. She then decided to press onto Doughboy hut. According to DOC times its about 7 hours from Hellfire to Doughboy and then another 7 hour to Doughboy. She did not reach Doughboy until after 2200. She would have had to cross part of Adams Hill under torch light. I can attest that is quite a slog to cover that distance in one day. Lot of boggy ground on Adams Hill

Mason bay is a big hut but very popular. Lot of people fly in with the planes landing on the beach at low tide. The day we were leaving Mason Bay the first time, a couple of planes flew over while we are having breakfast. Then about 45 minutes later a party of about 20 people arrived from the beach. There had only been 8 people at the hut prior to the arrival of this party. So if intending to stay at Mason bay, be wary of large parties flying in- especially at weekends.

Freds camp is another very nice location. Popular with hunters who can occupy up to 50% of the bunk spaces. Its only a small hut so there are not many bunks to begin with. When we were there was a hunting party and a DOC work party all there. The DOC party were camped outside. There hardly any suitable tent spots outside and the DOC tents were virtually pitched on the track. There is a jetty so the hunters can arrive by boat and bring lots of equipment. They may be limited to 50% of bunks but between them and the DOC crew they had 100% of the spare space in hut. There was no where for us (2 people) to put our gear. Not even on the veranda outside. Freds Camp virtue to me is its location. The jetty is a great place for fishing. We had no equipment but the hunters were busy fishing in the evening. I am not joking but the guy we watched cast his line and within a minute would be hauling it back in with a fish. He caught mostly barracuda which were inedible because of the works in flesh. They had caught Blue cod and saw another hunter catch a salmon and even hooked a shark. This shark was about 5 feet long. He hauled it into the shallows and released it from the line. The shark slowly swam away again. The next morning we had to cook our breakfast down on the jetty because the hut was chock a block with the hunters and DOC crew cooking there breakfast.

If I can figure out how to post photos I can add a few photos of southern circuit to compete this report.

The hunters were very nice to us and gave us some Blue Cod to eat. There was a solitary hunter out at Doughboy. He flew in about 3 days prior to our arrival and was scheduled to fly out about week after we left. He was shooting deer on the beach just below the hut. He must have had a silencer on his rifle because we could not hear the gunfire from the hut. He too was very nice to us and gave us quite a lot of venison to cook. Just as well we had surplus gas in our canister as cooking the fresh venison blew out our gas consumption in big way. This hunter also had photographic equipment. When he had enough hunting he was going to take his camera and go out photographing the deer. The temperature is very cool down there. Both at Doughboy and Freds camp the hunters left their kill hanging from tree branch. No flies that we saw.