Adventures and first routes on Mt Ada, 27-29 December 2018
The beginning.
Quietly nowPaddle over the calm water of the sound
Surrounded by this incredibility
Of mountains shooting straight up to the sky
With mist scarves and waterfalls
Hundreds of metres above us.
Sun, of the early morning kind.
Podocarp forest illuminated
Such colours of green.
Rimu trees,
Red rata flowers.
So much birdsong of tui and kaka and seabirds.
I love my life -
I love this place -
Here we start our adventure.
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| Beginning: two people share a kmart aquanaut (Maddy Whittaker) |
On arrival on a small island:
A kayak guide paddles up beside me“Where are you headed?”
“Mt Ada”
“Can you see it from here”
“Dunno”
“You know this is an island...”
“Oh cool!”
“...There are no mountains on it...”
“No. Nice forest though.”
It’s ok, helpful kayak guide. We are just walking along the river up its shores. We’re not as hopeless as all that.
Exhibit A, in argument against the previous statement - see our chain of cheap warehouse inflatable aquanauts, filled with all our worldly possessions (of food and expensive mountain climbing gear), wallowing along behind the two packrafts on pieces of string.
Arrival at the Milford shelter:
Sandflies.Lots.
We quickly deflate the boats.
Stash them and everything else we don’t want.
And
Eventually -
One of these days -
When we’re all quite ready -
Start on our way.
Walking backwards up the most expensive tramping track in New Zealand.
We walk past expensively dressed day walkers;
Past guided hikers finishing after three days, who smell better than we do… ever.
I bump into my friend Beth and have to be dragged away - we could chat all day.
This track feels like the main street!
After an hour, we cut down off the track
Following trap lines, navigated by our two handy local trappers.
I regret forgetting to get my gaiters
My legs get covered in hook grass
Ongaonga stings
Cutty grass scratches
Sandflies.
I keep my boots dry
By stripping off to bra and underwear across the Arthur
Unfortunately, the last few metres, the sand sinks.
So I’m not as dry as I could be.
Alas for the “critical line”
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| Crossing the Arthur and Critical Lines (Maddy Whittaker) |
Between us we cover a fair few years of the OUTC
Generations who know some tricks:
From afar - “That ridge looks good once you get onto it, we can try how that goes. Or Maybe WAY over to the left there, around that slip”
From underneath - “Let’s just go straight up here!”
Facing some bluffs - “hmm maybe we shouldn’t have gone straight up the middle.”
Waiting for the scout… “Yeah I’m up but it doesn’t go” “Not this way!”
We find a rather winding way up, eventually, to the ridge. Up through gaps in a lot of bluffs. The bits we go up are probably just as steep, only they have trees or at least scrub (or maybe just a fern frond) growing off them to hang on to. If it’s green it goes…. hmmm.
On the way down “This way works, it’s just very droppy”
Definition: droppy terrain - lots of small vertical drops about two metres high that you get down by sliding, holding onto ferns, and hopefully landing on nice cushiony moss.
Generations who know some tricks:
- Wear business shirts for the best protection from the Environment
- One walking pole, ready to be adjusted to “Extreme Mode”
- Asolos are wonderful boots
- Know how to judge and avoid the worst of the bush
- Know how to crash through bush regardless
- Know the cheat codes (after all, this is all just a virtual reality)
- Don’t carry water in Fiordland - just have a cup clipped to the outside of the pack
- Alas, in this wisdom, we can still fuck up
On Vertical Bushbashing:
From the map - “We probably want to go, like, up to the right onto that ridge”From afar - “That ridge looks good once you get onto it, we can try how that goes. Or Maybe WAY over to the left there, around that slip”
From underneath - “Let’s just go straight up here!”
Facing some bluffs - “hmm maybe we shouldn’t have gone straight up the middle.”
Waiting for the scout… “Yeah I’m up but it doesn’t go” “Not this way!”
We find a rather winding way up, eventually, to the ridge. Up through gaps in a lot of bluffs. The bits we go up are probably just as steep, only they have trees or at least scrub (or maybe just a fern frond) growing off them to hang on to. If it’s green it goes…. hmmm.
On the way down “This way works, it’s just very droppy”
Definition: droppy terrain - lots of small vertical drops about two metres high that you get down by sliding, holding onto ferns, and hopefully landing on nice cushiony moss.
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| Bush was bashed ft Aidan (Maddy Whittaker) |
The memorable things:
From the ridge, we carry onwards through the consistently argumentative trees, rocks and large drops, holes in the ground, lawyer vine and other unpleasantness. It’s great! One noticeable change from general Fiordland expectations is that everything is not WET. It is not even Slightly Damp, in fact it almost exceeds “Bone Dry” (See Antics 2015 for a guide to wet in Fiordland). This is… pleasant. Or would be, if we were not starting to get slightly thirsty. Drink bottles are getting rather light. Dinner time is starting to approach. We continue along the ridge, but with the impending awareness that on a ridge (and everywhere accessible to where we are) finding a water source may be… tricky. (Look there’s a river… twenty metres horizontal and about 800m below…)But Luck was on our side! (as it always is if you are a Good Tramper and practice responsible tramping etiquette.) Getting out of the Bush and into the Sub Alpine Bush/Scrub (twisted trees hanging with lichen and moss and prickly leaves), there in a hollow amongst the Spaghnum moss, I see a tarn! Oh dirty tarn, never did muddy brown water with bits in taste so good! Never was such foul and tainted water so well received! What a beauty you were, oh lugubrious tarn, what a find. Max skipped back through the trees holding half a bottle of the holy waters for the dehydrated stragglers. Everyone drank and was merry. And thus it was we decided to stop here for the night.
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| Our wonderful campsite (Rowan Cox) |
Camping in Fiordland (day one)
It was a pleasant rocky spot, with some small knobbly trees for shelter, dry moss for cushions, rocky slabs for tables, and plenty of open air to take in the vista. We looked around us at the surrounding vertical peaks - so many! In such a small space, with kilometre drops between each one. Ah fiordland I love you. “Anywhere you can see you can walk to in a day” - yes, if I could walk on air.Settling down, we went about the important tasks of campsite arrival.
- Put a billy of brackish tarn water on to boil for tea
- Delve into the pack for sandfly proof clothings (so much vertitude gained and still not high enough to escape them)
- Subtly empty undergarments of leaves (I am the master of this - so much so that Maddy taking photographs of me didn’t even capture undeniable proof)
- Take sunset photos and photos of everyone inevitably in the middle of changing
- Claim nooks for sleeping - preferably sheltered but still with a view
- Spin some yarns about the day
- Inspect the damage the bush managed to inflict. Norm’s shorts definitely came out worst.
- Find the dinner things (“Who has the onions?? Where’s the fuel?? I swear there was more cheese than this!”)
- Experiment with further sandfly proofing options (Aidan - “This bag the pot was in is mesh. Look it fits over my head perfectly! It’s a bug face net”)
- Discover, with great joy, that Norm has carried AN ENTIRE TOBLERONE up the hill… “Eat it all” he says. Ah the wonder of Christmas
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| The subtle art of emptying underwear as demonstrated by Torea (Maddy Whittaker) |
With cups of tea at hand and dinner on the go, and as sandfly proof as can be expected, we sat and enjoyed the view, the company, and the memories of the day. Time to start thinking about tomorrow! Looking at Mt Ada, it looked like there was some happy alpine climbing to be done by some, and some happy easy scrambling for the others. We wanted a day for climbing and… well pretty probably a whole day to get back down. The big question, of course, was the weather. Here comes the great gift of THE INREACH! Communication in the great outdoors. Sending a simple text - “Weather Mt Ada” - to a couple of convivial climbing comrades currently confined in Christchurch, who had no idea who it was from or what we were doing, we nevertheless received a thorough and useful reply. Basically, fine tomorrow, front tomorrow evening, after that fiordland WET. Right then. Ah weell, early morning then, and we’ll enjoy tomorrow while it lasts.
Wonder of Fiordland
Granite
Happy tussock ridge with curvy mounds and hollows to begin
We see a family of weka -
Three babies like dinosaurs with legs too big -
And lots of cool alpine plants!
At 11 we decide to have our first lunch.
Carry on to slabs and jumble-granite
Hear some rock wren
There is a rock that pees -
Honestly! -
A tiny hole in the rock that spurts out clear water in a perfect arc.
We reach the snow slope and have lunch number two (yum!).
We don’t have crampons, dammit.
But Over there, that ridge to the low peak, that’s a worthy looking scramble!
We go to it
Joyful!
Steep scramble
To illusive peak
With beautiful granite
In the sun.
What more could one want out of life?
We collect summit rocks
And descend back towards our campsite
Happy.
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| Above the bush at last (Maddy Whittaker) |
On Enjoying the Day while it Lasts
Wonder of Fiordland
Granite
Happy tussock ridge with curvy mounds and hollows to begin
We see a family of weka -
Three babies like dinosaurs with legs too big -
And lots of cool alpine plants!
At 11 we decide to have our first lunch.
Carry on to slabs and jumble-granite
Hear some rock wren
There is a rock that pees -
Honestly! -
A tiny hole in the rock that spurts out clear water in a perfect arc.
We reach the snow slope and have lunch number two (yum!).
We don’t have crampons, dammit.
But Over there, that ridge to the low peak, that’s a worthy looking scramble!
We go to it
Joyful!
Steep scramble
To illusive peak
With beautiful granite
In the sun.
What more could one want out of life?
We collect summit rocks
And descend back towards our campsite
Happy.
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| A good spot for second lunch (Maddy Whittaker) |
We get to watch the weather coming in
And the boys slowly abseiling down a fun looking first ascent.
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| Max contemplating, belaying (Rowan Cox) |
Camping, the second day
We got back earlyish, and made dinner. The boys arrived at the same time as the first spits (large drops) of rain, just as everything was ready. Everyone was happy and chatty and had had a wonderful time. What joy to be in granity mountains! Norm pulled out A SECOND TOBLERONE. Really Norm, what is this magic? How heavy was your pack??The rain was starting to commit. We got out the tents. Still two people would have to sleep in bivy bags. Rowan in bivy bag slept with his head in the vestibule. Throughout the night inched further and further into the tent. Maddy ended up using his shoulder as a pillow. I think I headbutted someone. It was a little squishy. It definitely exceeded Slightly Damp, and even Damp, probably it was Wet. For those in bivy bags, probably worse. But not to worry, we have a whole day of vertical bushbashing in the rain to look forward to!
On descending:
It was wet.It was very droppy.
We took out a few tree ferns.
At one point I decided to slide down under a log
I am covered in mud, dirt, blood, leaves, sweat
But no tears (yet). I am having a wonderful time.
By the time we reached the bottom, the rivers were very high. Not to worry, just have to walk another few kilometres upstream to a bridge. I got very hungry. My lack of gaiters grated on my nerves - or, ongaonga grated on my nerves due to my lack of gaiters. My legs kept bleeding, however it was fine cos the rain washed the blood away straight away so who could tell?
Eels could tell. We met some eels. Norm was not fond of eels. Rowan ran very fast. It was amusing.
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| Rowan running from eels (Maddy Whittaker) |
On lunch:
We had lunch in a BONE DRY hutI discovered that no amount of peanut butter is too much in a wrap
(this is not true in other circumstances)
Norm pulled out - yes - A THIRD TOBLERONE! The magic truly never ends.
Thus fed we recommenced our journey, making our way along the Great Milford Highway in the rain.
Oh waterfalls! / Dripping leaves! / What is Fiordland / Without thee?
And, at long last, we were back at the packrafts.
Oh waterfalls! / Dripping leaves! / What is Fiordland / Without thee?
And, at long last, we were back at the packrafts.
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| Rain rain lots of rain (Maddy Whittaker) |
The end.
Quickly nowPaddle onto the swollen estuary
Leave the sandflies behind you
Leave the achey feet, stinging legs
Behind you.
Paddle
Into the calm water
Where raindrops sing on the surface
And mist wreathes the cliffs
Around you
They surround you
The water falls a thousand metres
Above you
And
The rimu trees
Are so so green.
Just float
Oar stroke, oar stroke
Breathe.
After this long day swimming through the trees
Now swim in this deep ending of the sea.
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| Our wonderful packraft chain pulls in at Deep Water Basin (Maddy Whittaker) |
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