ROUTEBURN!
ROUTEBURN TREK
***Pictures at the bottom!***
Queenstown is a madhouse!!! It’s crazy how hard it is to find someone actually from NZ there. Anyways I had a day or so after my drive to make sure I was all geared up for the Routeburn walk. This was the walk i’ve been most looking forward to. It’s a tiny mountain pass that bridges the southernmost part of Mount Aspiring national park with the Fiordland world heritage area. Both regions get a phenomenal amount of rain and snow fall. Last year Fiordland got nearly ten meters of rain fall! So I went into it expecting to deal with some serious weather, so serious in fact that I was told at the Department of Conservation (AKA, DOC) information center that the saddle was closed due to avalanche risk and I would either need to cancel my plans or take a brief helicopter transfer over the affected area. That was a pretty easy decision to make.
Day one:
Because The track stretches from one fairly inaccessible region to another, I booked a shuttle service to get me to the start and pick me up at the finish. It’s a gorgeous drive along the lakeside from Queenstown, north into the mountains. There’s a particular range that my driver told me has played the role of the Alaskan rockies, swiss alps and himalayas for various movies, along with being the backdrop to Sarumon’s tower in Lord of the Rings.
Anyways, it was a super easy hike. Granted I only had to hike an hour and a half to my first campsite at Routeburn Flats. A nice valley meadow at the base of the mountain. It was so hot and sunny there I actually worked up a sweat just setting up my tent! As it turned out, the only rain I would see on the trek was a light shower late that night as I slept.
Day Two:
Checking with the ranger before I left, she told me that the saddle was open! I’ll admit to being somewhat disheartened about missing out on that helicopter ride, but it turned out that section was also the most beautiful section to walk. Anyways, I left bright and early while clouds still obscured the mountain I had to hike over. This was the longest day of the hike and included almost all of the elevation change. Just as I passed the Routeburn falls waterfall, the weather started to clear and the sun beamed into the grandeur all around me. About halfway through the days hike you end up near the saddle, overlooking a truly giant alpine lake. The signs telling you not to stop because you were in an avalanche danger zone were super motivating for the uphill bits.
Upon reaching the saddle you officially cross over into Fiordland, and the looking across one giant glacial valley to mountains on the other side, you could see hanging valleys lining the walls of rock, all feeding into the main valley below. After the saddle the trail hugs the border between the lip of the valley and the base of the mountains. By the time you see lake Mackenzie (my next campsite) down below, are thoroughly exhausted from the exposure to the sun. After about a thousand switchbacks down into the lake valley, nothing was going to stop me from a swim. IT WAS SO COLD! from under the crystal clear mountain water you could see all the way up waterfalls in the valley to the snow capped peaks that fed it. I swam until my whole body burned from the cold, knowing I could warm up in the piercing sunshine after.
Day Three:
Down, down, down. Most of the final day was spend walking down through and across the beech forrest that lined the valley bellow. The shade was a nice break from the heat, and the valley contained no shortage of waterfalls, including a 160 meter one near the end of the trek that made for a nice shower as the trail led through it. It would have been so nice to go strait to my hostel and have a real shower after the trail end, but because of the remoteness of where it drops you, it meant five hours on a bus to get back to queenstown.
I recorded a bit of audio along the way. Truth be told I've run into a problem with one of my usual mics and it's a bit to noisy for most applications now. Luckily I've got my backup XY capsule and I still have my trusty shotgun. To be honest i'm not broken up about it. Not taking the bigger mics along actually saves me quite a bit of weight as well. Seeing as how not bringing them means not bringing their shockmounts, stands, cables and other accessories either. Anyways, if the audio seems of a lower quality, that might be why.
If I had gone blind at the end of that trek, I could have made peace with the dark.
No time to rest though… I’ve got Fiords to explore...
