takaka to karamea (heaphy track)

here's the official record of our four days on the heaphy track, the only one of new zealand's great walks that we've done so far.

wed, nov 18
takaka to perry saddle hut, 10.5 miles

our 10 am shuttle to the start of the heaphy track arrived at 11:30, so the day began with concerns about our ability to reach the first hut before sundown. while we waited for the bus, we foudn a brochure for a competitor that ran more frequently and more cheaphy and wished that we'd discovered this company earlier. the hour-long bus ride was interesting, as i sat next to a belgian guy my age who's had some incredible adventures aroudn the world. before arriving in nz he was in china, trekking across the gobi desert ("which isn't very wide...just three weeks to cross it") with his girlfriend and a donkey. they got lost when his compass filled with sand but were rescued by some passing bedouins. meeting these kinds of people knocks us down to size, curtailing our gloating sense of "we're real backpackers now!" it's good for us.
we made our way to the perry saddle hut with plenty of time to spare (it took 4 hours compared to DOC's 5 hour estimate), beating out the crowd of sprightly 70-somethings who are also joining us on this trip.

sign seen at a supermarket: "tasty nz corned silverback - $6.49/kilo". what the heck is a corned silverback?

thurs, nov 19
perry saddle hut to james mackay hut, 14.5 miles

what short days we have on the heaphy! 4 hours yesterday, barely 6 today, less tomorrow. the pressure to wake up for an early start is lessened as a result, so we were perfectly fine with leaving an hour or so after most of the older tramping club members.
the landscape between the huts today was incredible - wide expanses of high-altitude downs, flat and scrubby, that could almost be mistaken for the african savannah. i hope that's not a silly thing to say, as i've never seen the savannah. after so much forest hiking, pretty though it was, i'm fully embracing the change of scenery.

fri, nov 20
james mackay hut to heaphy hut, 12 miles

waking up is always a difficult process for me, even after consecutive nights of 11 hours of sleep, but i have recently been assisted by the partial deflation of my sleeping mat each night, which seems to want to help me by jamming my bony places with underlying sticks and rocks. this morning wasn't quite so bad, as the designated campsite placed us atop a wooden platform about 2 feet off the groups with straps hanging off from all sides to use as "stakes". surprisingly, this platform was located near a flat stretch of ground labeled "helicopter landing pad" - usually the landing pads are the platforms and the grass is for campers.
the 3-hour downhill stretch to the lewis hut was unremarkable, which emphasized the jurassic park-like landscape of tropical ferns and overhanging cliffs all the more. during yesterday's hike we crossed over from the nelson region into the west coast region (passing near the "rugged country south of rivendell"), and today we camped at the confluence of the heaphy river and the tasman sea. the sandflies, as we were warned, are out in full force; all evening it sounds like a light rain is tapping on the tent, but it's just the pesky flies hopping around on the underside of the rainfly. 

sat, nov 21
heaphy hut to karamea, 12 miles

but for the sandflies, there would have been no reason to hurry out of camp this morning, having just 5 hours ahead of us by DOC's generous estimates. great walks, being so visitor-accessible, have a high standard of maintenance that means easy tramping for those of us used to hiking on rougher standard tracks. in the end, it took us 3.5 hours plus a brief lunch break (we ate walking around in circles to avoid the sandflies) to reach the end of the trail, kohaihai shelter, where we'd planned to spend the night. being not even 1 pm, however, we chose to walk the 11 miles into karamea instead. 3 miles in, when a half-full shuttle offered us a ride at a price that "recognized the effort already put in", we took it and rode into town, finding a dirt cheap bunkhouse at a campground where we shared a room with a talkative elderly gentleman from reno who snored vigorously all night long. 
karamea itself, despite the attractive marketing brochures, is tiny and has little to offer, so we'll spend a day restocking and will then be on our way somewhere else...anywhere else.

-rachel

pictures:
1) crossing one of the many swingbridges over a flood-prone river 
2) a view of the scrubby downs. it was hard to get a picture, as it was so foggy.3) bryan perched on some rocks between lewis and heaphy huts 4) a bridge along the west coast on the final day of the trek