Ellen and I originally planned to tackle the fabled Routeburn Track -- a 40-mile trek through the alpine regions of Mt. Aspiring National Park and New Zealand's Fjordland -- over a period of three days. We'd cross the southern alps from east to west, stopping twice at government-maintained "huts" to sleep, and be able to proclaim that we'd completed one of the most famous hiking tracks in the world.
That didn't happen. We wimped out. It's not what you're thinking, though. We weren't deterred by the ups and downs of the tramp. Rather, it was the driving and logistical nightmare that scared us.
The difficult part of the adventure (for us at least) came once we'd finished the one-way hike and needed to undertake the 350-km roadtrip back to our car. Although you can cross the mountains in a straight line as a hiker, you can only do so via a long, round-about detour if your driving. And, since we'd already spent 3000 kms driving in the weeks leading up to our big hike, we weren't in the mood for much more. So we improvised!
We first knocked off the last six or seven kilometres of the Routeburn on our drive through Fjordland to Milford Sound. The Track ends at the road and follows the same trail as The Divide -- another famous New Zealand hike. So we killed two birds with one stone.
There was one glitch: Unfortunately for Ellen the opportunity to do this hike could not have come at a worse time, as she'd just lost her right hiking boot (which we later found at one of the campsites where we'd spent a previous night) and the trail was by far the most boggy, muddy, wet path we'd walked in New Zealand. She managed the hike in sandals and socks, and while she made it through unscathed, the same cannot be said for the socks.
We then completed the first 20 kilometers or so of the Routeburn later in the week -- after we'd returned to the other side of the mountains as per our (much more reasonable) regular driving schedule. We hiked up past the first two "huts" all the way to "Harris Saddle," which marks the highest point on the trail. (The cabins at the saddle, by the way, turned out to be two of the most crowded rooms I've ever seen in my life.) And, to get the full Routeburn experience, we descended the same way to sleep at one of the "huts" before completing the in-and-out trek the final day. My only complaint: No hut talk by the warden. Highly disappointing.
Here are some pictures from the hike:
(And for those keeping score it's true that we did only 26 kms of the full 40-km Routeburn Track. But it felt like we did all 40 kms, so it counts.)
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