Advertisement
Published: February 27th 2007
Rising bright and early- although not that early, in fact, i think we were among the last to leave the Hut... rising none the less, we set out for a second day of tramping. We'd spent the night at Luxmore hut and had met a Belgium dude, Raf, whom with myself and Fred was tutored in the ways of a Maori card game by Alex.
The days' walk lead us over a range of ridges, up and down, and the start involved a reasonable assent. Quite early on we came to a place, from where we could detour to the summit of Mt Luxmore. So leaving our packs by the path, we did so. This was the highest point of the Kepler track, and had some excellent views, albeit the weather was a little overcast.
On returning to the path, we found we'd not returned a moment too soon: A Kea had come to investigate our stuff! Kea's are known for their inquisitive and sometimes destructive nature, none-the-less a fascinating creature. We continued along the track with some stunning views around and some great ridge sections. We knew we didn't have a long day's walk ahead of us, and
In the morning... when I wake up...
It's not just the photo that's blury, believe meit was good to take some time to soak up the surroundings.
When eventually we began to descend from the Apline ridge, we found ourselves in, what I can only describe as 'the ancient forest of elves'! No wander they filmed LOTR in this country, if they have places like this. The hanging lichen and gnarled tree forms were extreme to say the least, and when at last we reached the campsite in the valley, I was thoroughly disappointed not to have had a first hand encounter with Treebeard.
We stopped part way down to bathe the feet in the river. It was soothing, but incredibly cold! Colder perhaps than the lake at Queenstown! Nevertheless, I'd developed a blister on day one, and it was glad of the break after the best of the days hike.
The campsite for the night was 'Irisburn'- burn generally meaning river in these parts. Pretty much the only thing I will remember about this place was the Sandflies. I think these little buggers are fairly unique to New Zealand. They're like mosquitoes, but bigger, with a bigger appetite for 'manflesh'. They were EVERYWHERE! And they madly swarmed around us as we
Raf, Fred, Myself & Alex
The summit of Mt Luxmore - 1472m struggled to get the tent up. Once inside, we stayed put, watching them swarm in the porch and killing the occasional one that had made it inside with us. The one consolation about Sandflies, is they're really easy to squish.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.034s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 8; qc: 18; dbt: 0.0166s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1mb
roger (unc)
non-member comment
Looks like you're seeing lots of new and interesting places although the 'soothing' stream looks Exmoorish. keep in touch