Of Wild and Wonder

28/12/2019 - 29/12/2019 Party: Conor Vaessen, Tom Hadley I eagerly jumped off a bus straight into Conor’s corolla, parked in the Dunedin Countdown carpark. After a whirlwind of shopping and gear accumulation, we hit the road, headed towards the Darrans mountains, headed towards the granite, headed towards pure unadulterated stoke. After a night spent at some high quality accommodation (camped in a paddock near Gore), we parked at Homer Tunnel and tilted our heads back to take in today’s objective, the Talbot MacPherson traverse. This traverse of between the peaks MacPherson and Talbot is the classic mountaineering day trip of the Darrans mountains and has been enjoyed by generations of kiwi alpinists. As we started climbing towards Talbot’s ladder, the sheer immensity of the Darrans was impressed upon us. The looming granite monoliths around us formed an incredible amphitheatre of grey rock, soaring into the dramatic cloudscapes above. Once the ridge was gained, we made our ...

22/12/19 - 25/12/19 Party: Torea Scott Fyfe and Maddy Whittaker It was 9pm lying in Rowan's lounge in Wanaka, looking at met vu at the stretch of good weather between us and Christmas. My plans to attempt Aoraki had fallen through, but big peaks were very much still on my mind. I turned to Torea, "How about Sefton?" At 4am the next morning we left for the West Coast. Setting off at the start of the Copland Track at around 9am, a cloud of sandflies chasing us and our 30L packs, which we were trying to pretend were as light as they were small. It's beautiful forest and mostly flat track which made a great backdrop for a good long catch up yarn with Torea. Having both been working with DOC in remote places (Anchor Island and the Haast Ranges) for December, it'd been too long since our last trip together. Despite the immaculate met vu forecast, it rained that afternoon. We flew up Scott Creek, didn't find the start of the Bluewater Track, started bushbas...