Greenstone Caples

You know you are back at University when you wake in your van to find a half-full whisky bottle and a bear suit under the seat.


Good nights in Christchurch. Secured front row tickets for a Bill Bailey show and drove up a day early for a much mooted "Muppet Party" with the Canterbury geology postgrads. A bit of a furry scene. Great walking about a mile there in costume. Kiwis are big on yelling from their cars, and big on costumes. Put them together, and you have a whole night worth of entertainment.

Next day was the Bill Bailey show. Fantastic. First time seeing him live. Glad he was gentle with me.

Afterward we headed into the Lyttelton midwinter festival. Lyttelton serves as the port for Christchurch, sitting just over a ridge (or through the tunnel) but culturally very separate. I like port towns for just this reason. They tend to be a bit rougher but more vibrant. The bar-band scene is usually solid, and the pretensions minimal. Lyttelton is quickly gentrifying, but for now holds onto its ragged charm.

Festival night involved half a dozen bands and a couple of DJ's playing in venues and shops on various floors of buildings surrounding a central courtyard. Vibrant, chaotic, loud. Flitted from a basement with freeform jazz and scat to a standard rave scene to a jam band to a glam performance by 50 year old men in catsuits. I think I will have to return to Lyttleton when the time allows. Towns like this produce good people, and this was no exception. I have met better people sleeping on floors than in any hotel I have ever stayed. In one night I saw five bands, met an Alaskan traveler, developed my own three apostles who were convinced I was Jesus, danced and sang.

And go hear the Eastern. Lyttelton encapsulated and made music. Another example of my friends being better than I deserve.

I spoke with one of the closest companions of my early teenage years recently. He has grown into a fine, upstanding and stable family man. Like me. But in real life.

Anyway... as we discussed our most recent adventures and compared notes on the survivors of our youth he related a story which made me laugh harder than I have in many days, though it is a contextual thing. I think I laughed because of the sheer brutality of youth. Plus, it really was funny at the time.

We had an ongoing feud with a certain authority figure in our lives who had a large family, even in Mormon terms. One day as we strolled past their yard we noticed that the youngest, maybe four or five, had been strapped into a stroller-like device and was sitting unattended in the front yard (back in the day when you could do such a thing, if we weren't around). Without missing a beat one of us walked up on the grass and nudged the stroller so that it was now sitting atop an active lawn sprinkler, soaking the restrained child from the shoulders down. As the wailing began we continued our leisurely promenade up the road.

Minor but absolutely pointless cruelty. Yet deeply funny in retrospect. Humans are very disturbed creatures.

Which brings me to tramping with Travis.

Nah, the guy is a saint.


First winter tramp in En Zed, and by local standards South Island has brutal winters. They also grind up Frosted Flakes with tomatoes and one part per million jalapenos (pronounced hala pen ohs, or occasionally jala pen ohs) and call it hot salsa. Everything is relative. But the Southern Alps do get snow, which I miss terribly. I have prayed for a true blizzard to hit Dunners; when it does I shall stand nude on Cumberland Street and laugh as their civilization turns to dust and embers around them. Until then I will just snort and look disgusted when they speak of local winters. The Kiwis are genial and pleasant lot, but they need one more island half way between Stewart and McMurdo. Then this country would have everything, and they would have to pry me out like a tick. They still might.

Spent the night at Kinloch lodge on the shore of Lake Wakatipu. Gorgeous, and had it almost to ourselves. A newlywed English couple joined us and then proceeded not to speak to us or each other throughout their meal and most of the evening. Looked fun. The gent finally broke the silence by asking where I was from, and discovering it was Alaska proceeded to say: "Well, I have something to say that you should like!" He then proceeded to praise Canada and slag the States at some detail. Sitting silently watching this performance I finally realized that he thought Alaska was part of Canada and that, as a Canuck, I would be charmed by how little he thought of Americans. I smiled and told him that I liked Canada too, but that sometimes crossing the border from Alaska to Canada was a bit difficult. His face clouded briefly, and he wandered over to speak to his wife in low tones. He offered one look full of horrified embarrassment, and the silence fell again.

The hot tub on the hillside made up for all such Brit awkwardness, especially given the lack of sandflies and mozzies in the bone-chilling weather that ALMOST WENT BELOW FREEZING. Quelle horreur!


First Morning. The Caples/Greenstone was our target as the more classic walks were either on the North Island, had already been done by us (Heaphy, Abel Tasman inland/coast), or are actually impassible during winter despite my sneering dismissal (Routeburn, Milford, Kepler, etc.). The alpine areas in the Alps get huge amounts of snow, very quickly, and avalanches are a constant danger. The Caples and Greenstone valleys are low river valleys with one saddle between them. Perfect for winter walking, assuming weather holds. For the most part, it did. The Caples is fractionally more difficult, so we attacked it first.


It hovered around 0 C for most of the journey, dipping a few below at night and melting in the sun. The streams in the shade produced incredible displays of ice as the running water splashed over plants and stones. Beautiful, but deadly to walk on.

Being valleys much of the area was shaded throughout the short winter days. Frost developed in layers, as fog would rise from the sunny areas each morning and settle in nearby trees. Given the absolute lack of anyone else on the trail (we saw one hunter in the first 15 minutes of the first day, and no one else until late on the second) the noise of our footsteps crushing the frost on the grass, and me jumping on every piece of white ice I could find over puddles and streams, echoed without answer.

Perhaps because of this we talked little. It felt like a quiet place.



Though not as dramatic as the alpine stretches of the great walks, when out of the trees the crystal clear skies and the expanse of the valleys we wandered up impressed deeply. This is a radically different experience than the summer slog flanked by sandflies and other trampers trying to be the first wherever they are headed. It is difficult not to hurry yourself when you are passed by a succession of people on a trail. Travis and I had the peace to just be here, and the art formed by the undisturbed effect of winter on the landscape encouraged our slow, deliberate travel.




At the midpoint of the first day's walk is the Mid Caples hut. As you approach across a solid, unbroken valley floor you suddenly find a very narrow gorge, filled with water so violent and distressed as to seem like a relic of an entirely different place. Nowhere else on the tramp had any structures like this.


The Mid Caples was in the sun and commands a beautiful vista. It was also well stocked with coal and dry wood, but the sun was bright and we were young. A break, a dram, and a bite; then we were off. We would regret not packing a bit of the coal with us.


The hut for the night. A bit higher, a bit shadier, and completely lacking in coal and dry wood.


A night spent encouraging wet wood to burn so that we could dry out other wood to burn to dry out other wood. And poker. And whisky. And food. My diet these days is pretty limited but on the tramps anything goes. Daily chocolate ration is somewhere around a kilo.



Next morning found as a bit less bright-eyed, but not a smidge less darling.



The second half of the Caples led us mostly in cover, albeit as unique of cover as snowy fern gardens. After midday we broke out onto the highest portion of the tramp, the walk over the down up to McKellar saddle. Best views of the trip, and the weather held clear and cold. Perfect walking day.



McKellar is gorgeous, though I would guess in warmer weather it might veer toward the muddy side of things. For us it was ice and snow, fantastic for walking but a bit problematic when it came to descent. The climb up McKellar from the lower Caples is gradual, but the descent certainly is not. The pictures do not do it justice, but the trail comes to an edge, then drops precipitously more than 400 meters. The trail follows a streambed cut into the face of the steep slope. The stream, of course, now being nothing but a curtain of ice. And your intrepid narrator somehow forgot his ice axe and crampons.


I reached the streambed first, turned to Travis, and announced: "We are going to die."



Others had come to this conclusion as well. Where the drop began a cairn of prayer stones had been built. We offered our brief Aves, placed a rock each, and dropped down. No pictures of the descent, both hands being busy.

I used to think of people as basically sane. An incident one night around a wine bottle completely dispelled this idea. I had secured a bottle of cheap white wine from my housesit and brought it over to share with a friend as we watched a film. Upon opening the bottle and pouring two glasses we smelled the wine, which stank exactly of human urine. Commenting on this, rather than throwing it out we looked at each other and tried a sip. Terrible. It tasted of rancid fish with undertones of nothing else. What would a reasonable person do? Throw it out, perchance? Instead, after both of us recoiled in horror and commented on the abomination, we looked at each other, the glasses of wine, and both took another sip.

What the hell. Sanity is over-rated.

We did make it to the bottom nonetheless, without any help from our reason.



After a stroll around the lake we came to yet another beautiful, empty hut. This one held a bit more in the way of fuel, and our night of feasting and cards included reveling in the relative warmth. This served as sharp contrast to the solo German girl who was one night ahead of us on the trail, leaving increasingly depressed and bitter notes as she traveled without a cooking stove or light source, alone through the winter. We would have rescued her, but she never slowed down.



The next day broke a bit colder, clear and sharp. The Greenstone was wider and less steep than the Caples, with a braided river dominating most of the valley floor. Hugging the tree line we walked without sign of others, aside from faint footprints in the snow.




A magnificent day.




Our last night was spent in a new hut just off the junction of the Greenstone and the Mavona. The hut system here deserves the praise it receives. This hut was spacious, insulated better than any home I have lived in here, and generally pretty sweet. Especially for just Travis and I.
The scenery held charms as well.



Final day of walking through frosted forest.




The valley held a few last surprises. The waterfalls were the loudest things we encountered in four days on the trail, and perhaps the most beautiful.



The peace that comes with a walk across a white plain in the absence of all but your close companions, sounds tamped by the snow cover and the mundane interruptions of other humans nowhere to be found, this is one of the great joys.

Next, the Routeburn in October with another trip down the Greenstone. It will be interesting to observe it covered with determined Kiwis and psychotic Europeans slogging through the mud. Somehow, I suspect a great deal of nostalgia for Travis and the snow.

Heaphy Track

Another semester, another bit of random Kiwi street-art:


While Dunedin is a University town, it is easy to forget that Otago is not the only college here. Otago Polytech, with its focus upon vocational programs, also has a vibrant arts scene. I do not know which group produced the above, but along with the omnipresent graffiti the road and sidewalk art make every day a bit of an exploration. Well, that and the broken glass and bits of body fluids lying about, also bearing testament to the student population.

Nothing scenic about the below picture, but it charms me. Apparently this Dr. Safari is MBCHB FRNZCGP MScIM and DVM. No idea what the first three are, but I am pretty sure the last one makes him a veterinarian.


Heaphy.

With Kyle's impending departure back to North America (at least for a bit) and his return with his guy (which will have an unknown impact on our heretofore swinging bachelor lifestyles ) it was decided that a final trip was in order. Winter in New Zealand rules out many of the Great Walks due either to off-season expense (Holyford) or weather-related dangers (Milford, Routeburn, etc.). The Heaphy Track is on the north end of the South Island near Abel Tasman. It is fairly low altitude and sheltered from the worst of the coastal weather for much of its length. It is generally open without restriction for most of the winter, so we decided to give it a try.

Two complications arose. The first is that as the Heaphy links two dead end roads we would come out six hours by car from where we went in. Second, the weather reports were dire. Papers warned of the worst storms in two years and terrible rain and snow on the trail. After the ten hour drive to the start, we were willing to take the chance. Or perhaps we were simply not bright enough to care. This trait has served me stunningly well over the years. Either way, the next morning we appeared on the trail reasonably intact.


Turns out we were to have the best weather on the South Island. While most of the island flooded, the Heaphy had a bit of moist mist and a few good rains. The warned of flooded rivers and impassible storms never arrived. Much to my secret disappointment.

The Track features an initial day of climbing, followed by two days crossing the downs before you descend into the forest of the west coast. Not classic South Island alpine terrain, but beautiful nonetheless.



The kiwis are generally a practical people, and they tend not to waste much. A possible exception is food eaten after 3 AM following an All-Blacks match which never seems to be used for more than an hour or so before being donated back to the environment. That said, why throw out worn out shoes when you can carry them in a pack for two days and nail them to a random post in the middle of the downs?

The downs grow on you. Hard to find terrain like this elsewhere on the South Island. Riddled with caves and strange little chasms, the hills roll on for hours with flax and birds as your only companions. As well as the three older Kiwi chaps from Wellington. Nice guys, but they had a very different sense of tramping than ours. We went through a liter and half of Jameson's in two and a half days. They didn't. They went to bed every night at 6PM and slept until 8AM. We stayed up until 11PM playing cards and lying to whoever would listen. We left the hut before they did each day; they inevitably passed us en route. Needless to say we resented them deeply, especially after we ran out of whisky.

The huts were great for all of that.

And I found some fellow Nomites!



Did I mention that the downs are riddled with caves?


This jolly bird hesitantly approached us on the porch of the hut, shat next to our gear, and then waited expectantly for something. Approbation? A peanut? After a while it looked disgusted and wandered off.


One of the nicer things about being the oldest one in a tramping group is the limitless opportunity to look disapprovingly at the rest of the gang. Punks.


Post-rain and sunset at the high point of the downs. The next day we dropped down toward the west-coast rain forests.



Looking west from the saddle.



Travis assembles his nightly hut-fort. He then went on to severely bruise Kyle's brain.



The ocean at last, with the next hut nestled in on the saddle.



The forests here are jungles in reality; rich and dark. The rivers that drain them pick up so much tannin as to be the color of old tea.



Swinging bridges break the pattern of walking with moments of deep fear. Compared to the three wire bridges, however, these are stability itself. They also bounce when you jump on them.


Running out of time on the final day (we had a shuttle to meet) we dropped everything and tried to climb this waterfall. I damn near managed to release the logjam holding up the upper half. Kyle wouldn't let me.


The effects of the local fungi are generally positive.


Previous trampers have a habit of leaving donations to the local deities on trail markers. Here is a gift to Lewinsky, goddess of minimal underclothing.


Last day, last bridge, desperate need of a shower.


As we left for home we were shocked to hear that Gary Coleman had died, and happy that Travis had been elected Postgrad Rep in our absence. Or perhaps the adjectives should be reversed. I still have not come to peace with Travis wielding power. In honor of Gary's passing and the general brevity of life we stopped for a scrub at Maruia Springs. After five days without showers the bath houses and outside hot pools were glorious. Not sure I would have wanted to clean up after us, but you can't worry about such things.

On the way north one of my windshield wipers had completely broken off. Since it was the passenger side I thought little of it. As we drove south, however, the reports of weather calamities grew. Roads were flooded, snow blocked passes, and general mayhem was in the midst of ensuing. In the middle of a gigantic rainstorm north of Christchurch, the other windshield wiper let go. As near as I can tell, the new tires I put on Yokozuna allowed us to go about 120kph rather than 100 kph, and the stress broke the wipers clean off. Either way, we were pretty much screwed. Except for the hitchhiker.

Driving down out of the pass I saw a hitcher standing in the rain, and asked Kyle and Travis to pull over. I assured them that as I was in the back I would deal with the guy. He was a pleasant young Kiwi dude and I was tired. Seeing no danger I went to sleep, despite my promises to the two guys up front. I slept until I heard him mention that he was supposed to take three pills a day, but only took one because they 'slowed him down'. This woke me up, our hitcher being off his meds. Listening as I lay there I heard him talk about swapping random pills with the other drivers he had traveled with, and how his anxiety problem was not helped by the Ritalin he had just taken. I arose. His first question to me? "Do you like recreational drugs?" Really, exactly that. I have been asked lots of drug related questions over the years, but never quite like that. It would be like your alcoholic acquaintance wandering up and asking "would you care to consume some ethylated spirits?" The question stopped me dead.

Now I am used to surprises from hitchers. Once Karen and I had just dropped the boys off at a summer camp in central Alaska for a week and we were heading out to camp with our two dogs. Just outside of Fairbanks there was a guy hitching. I had my VW bus, so plenty of room, and I stopped. The gent was from Belgium and he was VERY grateful to us for stopping. He asked if he could grab his gear out of the brush. The next twenty minutes were a Jerry Lewis bit. He kept going into the brush and pulling out more gear. Boxes, coolers, a huge raft, tents, bags, food, guns, and finally a husky. I started out troubled, then pissed, then eventually simply laughed at the absurdity of it. When he was done Karen and our dogs were crammed in the back completely fenced in by at least a half ton of gear that this guy had been schlepping through Alaska alone. The van was so full that I could not shift properly and the husky had to sit on his lap so he could put more stuff at the base of the passenger seat.

Turns out he had rafted down the Yukon from his brother's place Carmacks solo, leaving the water at the end of a road barely traveled in Circle, Alaska. He planned to hitch home. It had already taken him six days to cover the 150 miles from Circle, and we could only take him as far as Delta Junction, leaving more than 500 miles to go. He seemed totally oblivious to the problems inherent in hitching that far with hundreds of pounds of gear, far more than any passenger car could carry. In fact, he was enjoying himself. We dropped him at the corner in Delta and as we drove off he was busily hiding his gear in the shrubs, waiting for the next unsuspecting moving van to wallow by. I have to give him credit for his optimism, though not for his sense.

The kiwi hitcher was just offering me pharmaceuticals. Before the conversation could progress much, the other windshield wiper let go, leaving us blind a long way from home. The hitcher mobilized to help, eventually unsuccessfully but after several adventures at the place he was crashing since being run out of Westport for 'rooting' the wrong girl. He directed us to a store outside Christchurch that might still be open at 5pm on a Saturday night in the middle of the worst storm in two years. They were, and showing typical Kiwi ingenuity they used tape and cable ties to get us back on road. As a matter of fact, I still haven't got around to fixing that....

The rest of the trip home was damned wet. Water on the roads that you could feel through the floorboards. Flooded signs placed in the middle of road-lakes rather than in front of them. Road closures and lots of detours through farm-roads crawling with crazed, frustrated, Kiwi truckers. Upon our final arrival we realized we really needed a mint juelp after that drive. Three bars later, we taught them how to make one. Huzzah!

Good trip.

This week saw the annual All-Blacks game in Dunedin, held for the final time at the old-school Carisbrook stadium, otherwise known as the 'House of Pain'. I am not a huge sports fan, but you can't miss something like this. Kiwis are rugby mad in the same way that Russians are vodka mad. The All-Blacks define the national character. They win, all is good. They lose...well, you'd best stay indoors. Plus it is rugby. Pure, unvarnished violence between consenting adults. Fueled by massive amounts of alcohol in the stands, and ego on the turf. What's not to like?

The opponents were the Welsh. Yeah, I know, the Welsh?


One thing the All-Blacks are rightfully famous for is the Haka. This wardance done before each match is meant to scare the opponents. In fact it is merely an excuse to make great faces at other grown men. Really, check out one on youtube. Great stuff.


No pads, no pauses, no whining. If you are going to play a blood sport, do it right.



Carisbrook was the last place in New Zealand that had terraces, stepped concrete areas where folks had to stand, and relatively cheap compared to the seats. Student area and damned lively. The police presence in front of them is not just for show. Keep in mind that everybody walking in the gate is buying at least one if not several 4-packs of Steinlager in green plastic bottles. Keep in mind as well that once you are packed into the terraces it is impossible to slip out for a slash. Some folks bring PVC tubes to piss in. Others just use the bottles. What happens to all these bottles of liquid? Watch the video below to find out. Keep in mind that the bottles tossed from the seats are empty, but notice how many full bottles are rising from the terraces. I can guarantee you that these are not folks to waste beer......





The All-Blacks stomped 'em. The party went on all night long and included our confiscation of an entire transit bus to get to our meeting place.

This is a fun little town.