Gloom and doom settled upon our second shelter on the Routeburn Track, the Lake Mackenzie Hut, overnight. AJ and I woke up in our bunks to dreary skies and a slow, steady drizzle. We were on a time crunch to catch our bus to Milford Sound; breakfast was fast and we hit the track.
Climbing has taken a big hold on my life in the past couple months. I freakin’ love climbing. I mean, I’ve always loved climbing, but with having regular-ish climbing partners and getting outdoors a bunch, I REALLY LOVE CLIMBING. There’s a reason why you shouldn’t let climbers into the backcountry, and that’s summarized by days like today. The agenda was fairly straightforward. AJ and I would hike up to Harris Saddle, then out to Lake Mackenzie Hut.
When I booked my New Zealand airfare, I kind of balked at the price. To compensate for being a lazy bum and paying extra for a nonstop flight, I decided to do everything else on the cheap and opted to stay in hostels. I’d heard great things about hostels and making all the friends. Somehow I managed to be really bad at doing the hostel thing and only really used the rooms to sleep and store my stuff, because activities. But here’s a roundup of the places I stayed at so you can pick your accommodations accordingly.
After making my way through Christchurch and Queenstown, I was finally heading out on the Routeburn Track! It had rained that night and my dreams of tramping this Great Walk were almost trampled by threats of high wind. I’d met my new backpacking friend, AJ, climbing the day prior and he asked if he could join me on the track. Though my whole mission was to wander around solo, I opted for some company.
Worst case scenario, we’d part ways. Best case scenario, it would be a blast. AJ and I woke up bright and early to a drizzly and gloomy morning. We were going to catch a TrackNet bus from Queenstown to the Routeburn Shelter where we would begin our tramping.
Day one of my solo trip in New Zealand began with touching down at 8am on Christchurch. I’d found a climbing partner on Mountain Project before I left but the weather wasn’t quite cooperating. My new friend picked me up from the airport and we headed to Godley Head to a hike a little loop he’d found in a guidebook somewhere. We hoped that it would clear up enough for us to head to a crag and get some routes in.