Day Trip, October 1969

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DAY TRIP OCTOBER 1969 The phone rang at 2 a.m. "You ready?" ideal combination. Angle Knob, Mac- "Yep." Gregor; the hills roll away in the dis- "See you in twenty minutes." tance, tawny-gold and beautiful. Nick By 2.30 we were heading north gives us a lecture on 'why hills go up' through the still busy city, Allan, Nick apparently in order to slow us young and I. They had had several hours fellows down so that he can catch up. sleep; I had been home from a party Such is wisdom. only long enough to brew some coffee Nick and I go after a 'red-line' by and change. sidling the Broken Axe pinnacles. This "Stop a minute A1, I want to get out." is a mistake; in the windless gully the Relief. heat is stupefying. At the mudpool be- A magnificent night gradually giving low South King the air is blue until the way to the growing grey dawn. Long billy boils and thirsts are slacked. Allan pale lines of light marked the Wairarapa saw his second deer of the day here; the coast; a thin, pale-pink streak of cloud first was on the track below Powell. gave hint of a golden day to come. It feels like mid-afternoon an is in 4.30. Holdsworth Lodge. the sun fact before twelve. The heat is taking tipped hills stretching into the morning its toll, and two of us are wilting. Mylight. Climbing Gentle Annie the sun self from lack of sleep. Still I am now appears over the shoulder of a hill, very sober. Downhill after Baldy; down adding to the glory of a perfect morn- through dry crackling bush to the cool ing. Past a sleeping Mountain House; heaven of South Mitre stream, a quick on to a brew at Powell. Travelling fast dip and we join the others all sunburnt this morning, light packs and an early and half asleep. The valley shimmers start. Further on an argument as to in the heat, the river is warm and very where Tweeddale lost his way, incredible low. Surely summer has come. now in the brilliant clarity of summer; 4.30 p.m. The Pines, to sit in the not so then. shade of a car, remembering. Twelve Past Holdsworth, East Holdsworth hours on the hill, thirty odd hours withand on to the tarns on Jumbo; a stop out sleep and I am content. My thanks to let the old man catch his breath. to Allan and Nick for making the trip The breeze is cool, the sun is hot, an possible.