Three Days in the Wild: The Pelorus Track

We are currently recuperating from an intense three-day, 35 km hike through forests, brush lands, and mountains just south of Nelson, South Island. Below is our pre-hike photo.

It was definitely a physically demanding trail, beginning with an hour of uphill (~30-40% grade) rocky terrain that claimed Brian's heels in no time (his blisters ended up being larger than silver dollars). Below is a photo of me during the mountain top leg of the hike--it was incredible up there, and the wind was relentless!

We made camp the first night in a semi-sheltered area at the edge of a hill with a great mountain view. Here's a funny story: So Staci and I bought a really cool camping stove about a week ago, and then Brian bought a couple of Butane fuel cartridges for the stove a few days later. The problem is that we never checked the canisters for compatibility with the stove (we talked about checking it but never did). This is the downside of traveling in a group--sometimes you assume that someone else has taken care of something that still desperately needs doing. As a result, once we were finished setting up our tents and were ready to cook our rice and salmon meal that we packed we realized that we could not use the stove or the butane cans that we brought along. Luckily between my magnesium/flint stone fire starter and Brian's butane lighter we were able to get a decent fire started quickly. The next funny part to the story is the salmon: we bought canned salmon at the grocery store assuming that it would be like tuna until we opened the cans directly onto the steaming pan of rice only to find out that along with the salmon meat came a spinal cord, tons of ribs, and skin. Needless to say morale took a dip at that point, but we held it together and simply picked the bones out of our plates and scarfed down the hot meal before the bone-chilling wind got to it. Afterwards we enjoyed the sunset over the mountaintops pictured below and passed out. What a day!

The next morning we woke up to frost on our tent, as it had rained for several hours the night before--we were all thankful that we had the foresight to pack our cold weather gear. We hiked the longest on this day, beginning at 10:30 am and finishing after 6 pm. We made a quick stop for water at the scenic hut below.


We were completely exhausted when we finally stopped, but the seemingly untouched scenery was worth the physical exertion (check out the waterfall below).

Another part of the day's hike that is worth recalling is the swing bridge...well, three of them actually. These things were incredible: long, narrow, and swinging over shallow canyons, not to mention each bridge had a sign posted on it, reading "Limit 1 Person at a Time!" We all lived, of course, but it was pretty intense (see video below).

On the last day of hiking, we only had to go for about 4 hours. This allowed for a bit more time to stop and smell the roses, or in this case stop and take a photo of some rising fern fronds (below).


The problem that we ran into was that the man that Staci and Jessica spoke to at the DOC (Department of Conservation) said that the end of the Pelorus track would bring us to the highway, where we would have no trouble getting a ride back to town from other trampers. The problem was that the track actually ended at a dirt path that was an additional 14 km from the highway. Luckily, when we stopped for lunch we came across two seasoned Kiwi hikers, Jim and Ian (pictured with us below), who offered to take us to the highway. These were tough Kiwis, and Ian at 70 was still able to hike at a pace that matched our own.

When we stopped off for ice cream before hitching a ride back to town, we were thoroughly examined by a large bird that looked like something out of Jurassic Park (pictured below).

We somehow managed to hitch a ride back to town within minutes with a pair of high schoolers that seemed to get a thrill out of the arrangement. We were grateful though, as they drove us the full 50-minute ride back to Nelson and even dropped us off at our awaiting car at the trail head. What a country!

I forgot to mention this earlier, but our tramping was strategically planned to coincide with the long weekend (this past Monday was Labor Day here in NZ), so that Tuesday (yesterday) we could take our car in and get the necessary repairs to make it street legal. I am happy to report that the panel and paint shop did a good job to really hide the damage to our back right panel and they replaced the busted light, but the electrical issues did not get fully resolved. We are taking care of that now (all repairs have come out to a reasonable cost), and we will be leaving Nelson this afternoon for the Abel Tasman National Park. There we will hopefully do some kayaking and experience some more beautiful countryside.

Mike