Ants Aspiring

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ANTS ASPIRING John Rhodes Bonar Glacier (Harry Smith) "Just try to your left, #4. Can you get up that way?" "So the entire trip now hangs on my upper body strength does it? Vertical acrobatics in subalpine scrub with 30 kg "Maybe, no, I don't think so. These goddam bushes are up was never a strong point with me, but here goes so close and it'sj just about vertical. There's a shortage of EEKI!...ouch! Made it I think! That was right at my traction around here. I'll just get a foot on this limit folks! Now, if I can just get over to that bit of branch....agh! Dammit, they're sO slippery! At least tussock and dump my pack...by the way, looks as though there's plenty to hang onto. I'll try again.. can you see its raining on the Main Divide." any footholds in there?... .erk!! Nearly did it that time. I'd be up if it wasn't for this bloody pack!" "There's no way we can get up where you did, you've made it sO slippery. We'll go straight up. I'll pass the "Take a breather for a minute, there's plenty of time.' packs. Oh heck, I can't. Have you got your firewood saw?" "What do you mean #2? We've been going for six hours and we've climbed less than 4000 feet! And we haven't "Yep, its right here on top, wrapped in my balaclava. I seen #3 for nearly an hour. I bet the bugger's up the top figured we might need it." laughing at us. How are you doing back there #1?" "Good, lets have it here. You know, they'll never believe "I've got scratches on my scratches and I'd quite like a this, sawing our way up a hill!" flat place to stand if any such thing exists around here and my underwear is up my bum and I'm hungry, why can't "Do you guys actually enjoy this? Like I mean, is this we have lunch? But these are minor things your preferred way of spending your holiday? Going fundamentally I'mjust fine and this is a great way to see without lunch until mid afternoon and indulging in hand New Zealand. I can't wait to mail a postcard to my Mom to hand combat with prickly bushes, is that your way of in Canada. That is, if they have postcards of places like appreciating the scenery? I guess in Canada a hundred this.' years ago you'd have been out there trapping beavers or prospecting for gold or something. Eric told me - "it'll be "#4, I'd better tell you that if there ever were any fun, Karen. You go along on Grant's trip and you'll have footholds here, you've wiped them all out.' a heap of fun.' " Well, just tell me when the fun starts won'tyou? I wouldn't want to miss anything.

"Well, you'll have something to tell your Mom about, if you Decisions: what to take, what to leave. Extra rope is out, so is survive. Not too many Canadian tourists get to cross the Haast the mountaincraft manual. Firewood saw is in. Karen prunes her Range." underwear to an irreducible 4 pairs. John has 2 books, convinced it will rain for a week. Harry has 6 rolls of film, "Not too many would want to." convinced it won't. Winch the lids of the packs down with the Fastex buckles, a little bit at a time. "Grant, I want to tell you something. I have a dream about this trip. It's that one day, we'll stop at 12 o'clock and sit down for These packs are powerfully attracted to the centre of the earth. a whole hour and eat our lunch and relax. This is supposed to "You forgot the helium dinners, Grant." be a holiday you know." Stagger into town. Park HQ is up a hill, so give it a miss. "Well yes, sorry about that #1, but we've already lost three days Weigh in at the InterCity terminus. The guys have 33 kg each, through bad weather and if we don't keep moving we won't Karen 25 kg; but on pack weight as percentage of bodyweight, complete the trip." she's a clear winner. Or loser. She's carrying 50 percent. The lads have 48.6, 45 and 39 percent. Harry (39%) spends the bus Complete the trip. The trip that started two months ago with a journey trying to calculate the factors needed to allow for scale. phone call to Harry and a letter to Grant. Harry's suggestion is Bigger people are not proportionally more powerful, he says. a loop around the North side of Mt. Aspiring through the However he needs a cube root and can't extract it in his head. Waiatoto and Waipara Valleys. Grant replies with a photocopy of the Mt Aspiring map with a ballpoint line on it, starting at Makarora. Pies, tea and the last real dunny for 13 days. We can Makarora and finishing in the West Matukituki. Underneath he's leave at 6.30 tonight for $25 each or now for $38. Now wins. scribbled, "Possible?" A tiny jet boat whizzes us down to the confluence and up the Wilkin. Bright sunshine. The first patches of beech forest. We A month of silence. Then minor panic! We must find a fourth swing in so close you can smell the leaf mould. Already, there person. There's this Canadian girl. Eric says she's OK. What are peaks with snow. Anticipation mounts. A shingle bar just about transport? The Hutt Valleys are heading for Wanaka, we downstream from Kerin Forks is the end of the ride. can go with them. Borrow another tent. Grant, seduced by bright colour and soft feel, buys a new 45 m rope. Get as much route info. as we can. Air photos, letters to the Park Board, Dunedinites who'vel been there, Hutt Valleys who've researched a similar trip but had to abandon it. Brian Hunt travelled the Waipara in '71, recalls 3 compulsory crossings, one difficult. Tony Gazely has been on the Volta. Lyndsay Fletcher has climbed the spur to the Bonar from the head of the Waipara. Nobody likes the Waipara. The Dunedin replies come in. "Watch the rivers," they say. John gets depressed, rivers frighten him. "Don't worry," says Harry. "Ift the rivers are up, we're going nowhere," says Grant. "I'll take a Tupperware bowl with a lid," says Karen, "we can keep leftovers in it." "There won't be any leftovers," we tell her. That makes John even more depressed. Zero hour approaches. With five days to go Grant, in Christchurch, is preparing food. 38,819 grams of it, to be converted into kilojoules by 4 people over 13 days. Eric's Ready. for action (John Rhodes) spreadsheet from last year helps. Computerised tramping. The Wheaton food drier goes non-stop. This trip hasn't even started The weather is as specified by Messrs. Fuji and Kodak. There's and it already has its story of heroism, an epic of food even a track. We trundle up valley, by-passing places with preparation and packing far into the night. "Its the last time I'll names like Wonderland which aren't on the main drag, and do that on my own,' says Grant. vowing that someday we'll come back to explore them. We camp a bit short of the eastern edge of sheet S106, and talk Wanaka motorcamp, 23 December. We wave goodbye to the around the fire till 11 pm. There's a ring around the moon and Hutt Valleys, to whom we've become curiously attached in our a bad forecast. day-long tour of take-away parlours from Picton south. good luck! Harry is up first. "This is not the Harry I once knew," says John. But the man has designs. He wants us to be above the Grant and Harry apportion the food according to Grant's master notorious waterfall in the South Branch before the bad weather list. "This stuff is yummo,' says Grant. "Better be, it looks comes. The rest of us aren't so sure. Decision time comes at heavy." The hypothetical trampers on Grant's list: 1,2,3,4, Top Forks Hut. Why by-pass the certain luxury of a 2-ticket become real food carrying people: Karen, Grant, Harry, John. hut, for the certain discomfort of tents at 4,500 ft? And so we Except our ability to transport all this food remains hypothetical. begin our slippery descent into hedonism. Its packed in double plastic bags, knotted tightly to provide a frustrated #4 with 39 meals worth of polythene feeding frenzy. John is a little injured that the others will not consume three of his biscuits each for lunch, and that they liken them to bathroom tiles. They're only a little bigger than the specification, he says.

We take a half day package tour up the Wilkin's North Branch. There are lakes here, of glacial origin, which out of respect to #1, wel label Huron, Ontario and Michigan. Heavy rain starts as we get back to the hut, and the three pikers feel smug. Harry's intention to sleep out, thereby saving himself eight dollars, becomes an intention to sleep on the verandah. We assure him that this is tantamount to using the hut facilities and that he will therefore be liable for the full fee. The rain becomes heavier, and Harry is seen quietly unrolling his pit on one of the bunks. Christmas carols and Baileys courtesy of Karen, and an improving forecast courtesy of the Canterbury Mountain Radio Service send us to bed in a state of good cheer. Christmas day. Edible presents are exchanged. The rain is clearing to showers. We're away at 10.30 sharp, heading up the South Branch on the last track we'll see for 9 days. Santa sends us beech forest, then scrub, then snowgrass and a million giant Camp on the shoulder above the Pearson (Harry Smith) buttercups. The showers return, coldly, and we huddle behind a rock for lunch. Ahead is our first obstacle, the fearsome 500 foot waterfall. "Don't worry "says Harry, "its nothing.' " John worries. Harry and John prospect the sidling route ahead, to where the whole Waiatoto valley opens up below. Across the Pearson, a The showers ease to drizzle. The route sidles the fall on the true ridge leads from the Waiatoto to Mt. Taurus on the Main left, up exposed snowgrass slopes. We apply to it a word which Divide. It's formed, like most of this country, in west-dipping is soon to be standard vocabulary on this trip: vertiginous. schist which slopes smoothly down to the river like the roof of Harry goes ahead and takes fly-on-the-wall photos of the rest of a house. Next to the north, but hidden from us, is the western the team. The travel is easy through the upper basin to a buttress of Mt. Ragan, called Stocking Peak. On 27 February campsite directly below Pearson Saddle. Harry starts his second 1891, explorer Charles Douglas climbed it in his socks. Nearby roll of 36. There's time for quick recess to the saddle and to is Mt. Betsy Jane, named after his dog. Rabbit Pass before beef stroganoff, steamed pudding and Karen's Christmas cake. 28 December. A genuine early start, 8.30 am. Well, kind of early. The views are A1 and so is the weather. But the outlook, Boxing day: wet and windy. Harry's Public Service bladder with high westerly clag on the way in, is Z9. allows him 24 and a quarter reclining hours. This is clearly a matter of pride. With Harry, pit-bashing has become a craft. He Once round the corner we can see for the first time the big Aexecutes it with style, refinement, even artistry. His pack is shaped mountain which it is our aim to circumnavigate. Grant carefully arranged to support head and shoulders at 30 degrees, and Harry eye up, for future reference, the ridge from the a suitable position in which to converse, read, doze, or take his Waiatoto to Glacier Dome and the Volta. Teichelmann and meals. His advice to others is designed that they might aid and Graham went that way in 1908, we learn. abet the record making-attempt. For example this, on cooking: "Biff it in, bung it on, boil it up, bolt it down." " It becomes our The Haast Range opposite looks distinctly alpine; but to the standard culinary procedure, to be recited before each meal. north it's lower and crossable by trampers, we've been led to believe. Between us and it, the Waiatoto comes tumbling down The 7.30 radio schedule has good news (there's an anticyclone from its glacial lakel below Mt. Aspiring. At Bonar Flats, nearly over the South Island) and bad news (we're at the bottom ofit, three miles away and half a mile below, it braids into tiny grey copping westerlies). The forecast is more of the same. Harry channels; but nobody is fooled. They won't be tiny when we get psychs himself for the Upper Wilkin 48-Hour Pitathon. there. 27 December. Breaking cloud in late morning shatters Harry's There's something funny about the Waiatoto. For about 20 feet dreams of recumbent fame. Lost time has shattered Grant's above the river on both sides, there are no trees. It looks as if dream of traversing the Volta. We depart for the Waiatoto at a monster flood has come down here. Later, looking at the 1.30. There's a quick route, says Grant. Other club parties have lichen on the boulders, we estimate 10 years ago. Later again, done it: straight down the Pearson River. enquiries prove us almost right. In November 1981, 500,000 cubic metres of schist slid off the Haast Range and displaced a The upper Pearson, full of buttercups and daisies and babbling similar volume of water from the glacial lake. The flood brooks, is like Eden before the fall. But then it funnels into a obliterated the hut and footbridge at Bonar Flats, and people gorgel like a bouldery, tramper version of the Benmore tailrace. living near the coast were woken by the sound of debris hitting John and Karen watch nervously as Grant and Harry explore. the bridge. Great is their rejoicing when the water is deemed too high. We must take the high and dry Moir route, indicated by an uncertain Below to our left is a step formed by a prominent fault trace, row of red dots on the park map. Trouble is, there is a day's recommended as the route to a spur beside the Bettne River, travel between us and the Waiatoto, and it's now 3 pm. The which in turn will lead us to the Waiatoto. But how to reach the answer, after a lengthy analysis of number of days versus step? The rock-and-snowgrass face is yes vertiginous. Harry distance remaining, is a sloping campsite on a snowgrass slips, tears his pack on his ice-axe, and has to stop and sew it shoulder high above the Pearson on the true left. up. Meanwhile, a safer route is found.

Snowgrass gives way to scrub, then bush. Everybody assumes Grant is disappointed in Bonar Flats. It had been a sort of wrongly that someone else has the navigation sussed. The result promised land to him, but the reality is scruffy: dead beech trees is two hours of near-vertical creek and bluff bashing in sodden killed by the 1981 flood, manuka scrub, and a bicultural array rotten bush. In any circumstances this would be difficult; but of plants. Native broom, bidibidi, tiny Blechnum ferns and small with these packs, its hell and exhausting. Occasional glimpses leaved Coprosmas mix it with European ragwort, thistles, sweet show vicious standing waves in the Waiatoto. John's spirits vernal, yorkshire fog and white clover. One has the feeling that droop. if one were to go a mile or two downstream one would find cattle, bits of corrugated iron and rusty barbed wire. We take At 4 pm we reach the river. Lunch! Brew! thinks John. It is not constitutional strolls down the flats under low, billowy cloud and to be. We must make haste, get downstream and cross, say drizzle which give the valley an air of mystery and wilderness. Grant and Harry. John' 's spirits droop more. Travel down-valley is easy but any enjoyment of it is nullified by tiredness, Harry starts his third roll of 36. impending rain, and the thought of battle with the monstrous, opaque river. "Don't worry" says Harry. 30 December. More rain in the night. The alarm is set for 5 am, at which time the rain is still heavy. Give it another hour, Near the top of Bonar Flats we prospect the tiny channels seen we agree. Ten minutes later the noise on the tents ceases and we from above and find them, as predicted, uncrossable. Then look outside. Stars! At 8 am we're away, following deer trails Grant notices a boulder bar. We ford the entire Waiatoto on a to the foot of the hill, then an ill-defined ridge just north of the long diagonal, needing to link up only for the first 10 metres. stream opposite the Bonar River. To bushline, the travel is After that its knee deep. John' 's spirits soar. There'sjust time to uneventful. We could be in the Tararuas. But then there's set up the radio for the forecast (rain). We camp in a clearing another 1500 feet, mostly in scrub (described while the credits in the manuka. The rain starts just as we get our tents up, at 9 were rolling) to our 4,600 foot saddle. The scrub peters out, but pm. Lest we become too cocky about having surmounted Major the Haast Range has more defences: unfriendly bluffs that Obstacle Number Two, an earthquake shakes us just as we're reduce John to quaking nervousness.. At 4 pm he emerges on top nodding off. still in possession of his life, and bellows a loud oath at the world in general and at DOC for design deficiencies in certain The rain continues heavily all night. At 6 am, a meat-hunting oft their mountains. Our average rate of climb has been 500 feet chopper makes four passes overhead but we slumber on. By 10 per hour, except for Harry who found a less hostile route. Last o'clock the rain eases, we get the fire going and John finishes night's camp-site is clearly visible, a painfully short distance last night's macaroni aux sandflies. Leftovers? This can't be below. right. Our day trickles idly away in reading, arguing (Canadians and Kiwis always argue), firewood gathering, Lunchtime is declared. We're getting back to our regular cooking, washing and letter writing. schedule. 291 December. Bonar Flats, Waiatoto Valley: Dear Mom, I don' 't We sidle north-west across a house-roof face with snowgrass know why I came on this holiday. I don 't know if we 'll ever get and nasty little gullies. John has sore feet and a raw pack rub on out of this place. I don' 't know if this letter will ever reach his lower back. The view down the lower Waipara to the Canada. The sandflies here are like vampire bats and we have Arawata, thence civilisation, looks enticing. Surely one crossing two more mountain ranges to cross. 1 had a wash today and got of the main divide is enough. He waits for somebody to suggest kind of clean. Kiwi males have strange attitudes about hiking. that the rest oft the trip should be aborted, so he can congratulate 1 don' 't think they want to see anything, they just want to get them on an eminently sensible idea. Nobody does. Under the where they' 're going. This is called Completing The Trip. They cloud that has been gathering all day, the upper Waipara looks go without lunch and keep walking until seven o' 'clock at night forbidding. John' 's spirits droop. so they can complete the trip. Please send me a hot water bottle and three pairs of clean dry underwear. Love Karen. Camp is made at 7 pm. at bushline on the ridge immediately north of Campbell Creek. Creating tent sites provides Grant and Harry with an opportunity to take vengeance on the landscape. 31 December. This is to be the day Karen will remember and savour. "Remember New Year's Eve?" she will say for weeks afterwards. "Eric was right, you know, about enjoying the trip. I enjoyed it for two whole hours, on New Year's Eve!" Keeping to a tight pre-noon departure schedule, we complete pressing commitments to sleep in, breakfast lazily and enjoy the sunshine before moving off at 11 am. The ridge heads southwest as straight as a ruler, defined by the intersection of Campbell Creek with anotherl house-roofmountainside, gloomily named the Spectre Faces on S106. A blind man with severe inner ear disorder would have difficulty in losing it. John has greatly advanced the condition of humanity and reordered the universe by adjusting his pack so it no longer Packing up camp at Bonar Flats (Harry Smith) rubs. Nobody is impressed.

At2 pm (time for morning smoko) we emerge from the bush. Dress for luncheon, taken near the Cook, is Gore-tex and PVC. The Waipara is a stone's throw away; but we ignore it, because right here is Engineer Creek. It's clear and not so very cold, The upstream end of the Companion Ladder is marked by a and has a beach and grass. Only the rows of cars and sun prominent bluff on the true left, visible from some distance umbrellas are missing. The next two hours, spent in washing, down-river. After a very long time sidling through very steep, sunbathing and gentle eating and drinking, will brighten forever very difficult and very wetl bush, made tolerable only by Harry's the chequered history of Canadian-New Zealand relations. supernatural lability to sniff out a good route, we spy flats below and descend. But the flats are on the other side; and there, Gerhard Mueller and Charles Douglas explored the Waipara in grinning down at us from upstream and not much closer than 1885. Their imaginations, perhaps fertilised by experience of before, is the bluff we thought we'd passed. It's back to the wet immigrant ships, gave nautical names to its tributary streams: trees on the hill folks. Bilge Water, Engineer, Cabin Boy, Ratline Water, The Common Sailor, The Second Mate, The Larry Bell, The Third Mate, Cargo Creek, the Rudder, The Cook, The Tar Pot, The Stoker, The Grease Pot, The Funnel, The Binnacle, The Fireman, The Cat O' Nine Tails, The Purser, The Steward. Overlooking this are Shipowner Ridge, Mainroyal, Skyscraper and Stargazer. We wonder if Lloyd's Register contains an entry for H.M.S. Waipara, and look suspiciously at each patch of bush expecting that any moment a bearded sea captain, in sea boots and oilskins and with a telescope under his arm, will leap out and shout "Avast there!" We boulder-hop on the true right up a moderate gorge to the next flats. A crossing is debated. Huntian authority declares that from here, the best travel is on the other bank. But what if, having gone that way, we can't get back to this side when we need to?. John's fearof rushing water asserts itself and he argues fervently against crossing. "This is an out-flanking manoeuvre," he says. "You need to second-guess these West Coast rivers." "Don't worry" says Harry. But to John' 's relief, his idea finds favour. Hmph! (Grant Wheaton) We celebrate New Year's Eve on the true right, beside the Larry Bell. The forecast is bad. We drop at last to a small, low flat just past The Stoker. Our leader says the river may flood it; but the way ahead on this 1 January. During breakfast, a cloud sheet comes scooting in side is walled by a bluff, its 7 pm and the troops are rebellious. from the west. It's like we're in a box with a sliding lid, We camp. operated by some celestial authority who believes that the proper observance of statutory holiday requires rain. 2 January. Clear sky! The river has dropped 25 centimetres! Karen feels better! We dry gearon the beach, ford the river and Ten minutes upstream, a bluff prevents further progress. continue upstream. This reach of the valley is pleasantly Anxious to justify his theory (and avoid drowning), John scans furnished with flats; and the Waipara, now we have passed most the valley side for a sidling route but is forced to admit that if of its seafaring tributaries, allows us to cross it almost at will. such exists it could take us most of the way to Stargazer. We Imagine the Tauherenikau between Tutuwai and Cone, widen it backtrack and Grant finds another diagonal crossing. John's somewhat, add snowy peaks above, and subtract all huts, tracks pleasure at finding himself on the true left, alive and dry, is and people. You now have an image of the upper Waipara. Its tinged with foreboding that we must get back to the other bank paradise. to pass the Companion Ladder Rapids, three miles upstream. A fine drizzle starts. Harry starts his fourth roll of 36. Staying close to the river the travel is easy (thanks Hunty). Four hours, including a scramble up Cabin Pass Rapids, puts us Harry gets out of sight ahead. We round a corner on the 57 grid at the outlet of the glacial lake. It's a kilometre long, shaped line and there's his pack, but where's Harry? Two thirds of the like a banana, and replenished by avalanches from the Bonar way to the other side. Grid lines, it appears, make excellent Glacier, of which this is the main outflow. If we're quick to river crossings. Harry has got over the main flow all on his follow their roar we can see them peeling away the icefall 2000 ownsome, following (you guessedit) a diagonal boulder bar. He feet above, but their plunge into the water is hidden around the comes back and we all do it together. John is beginning to think bend in the lake. he may survive this trip. We have two days to reach the Hutt Valley's truck at the Around the next bend, a clump of fallen beech trees bridges the Matukituki road-end. Our route options are (1) Waipara Saddle river. What a shame we didn't need them. and Arawata Saddle; (2) Matukituki Saddle; (3) up to and over the Bonar Glacier. A good forecast decides us on (3). The Canadian wisecracks and good humour that have enlivened our journey so far have thinned out somewhat. Like, there "I wonder how difficult it is" says. John. "Lyndsay Fletcher has aren't any. Canadian legs, it turns out, chafe badly in the rain. done it" says Grant. "I'm not Lyndsay Fletcher", says John. Karen hobbles on, silent and preoccupied. As if to compensate, "Don't worry" says Harry. our heavenly overseer thickens up the rain.

John on the Bonar Glacier (Harry Smith) 3. January. At 4 am its still fine but a screaming nor-wester has Our agenda for the next 12 hours is to be an anti-gravity put a row of hard-edged wave clouds aloft. The cooking fire campaign waged against 6000 feet of scrub, scree, rock, narrowly avoids incinerating several hectares of scrub. Breakfast snowgrass, ice and snow in varying degrees of vertiginosity. in bed is administered to three drowsy, reluctant trampers. The way to the Bonar lies up the ridge above us, to the true When the time comes to pack Harry's tent he has to be shaken right of the icefall. About 1500 feet above the lake we climb out out of it and stays horizontal in his pit on the ground, in protest of the shadows and look across at Hector's Col, a notch like a at such untimely rousing. gun-sight above sheer rock walls. The pioneer geologist came that way from the head of the Matukituki in 1863. One of his Just before 7 am we're ready to leave and the wind has two companions, a reporter from the Otago Daily Times, wrote moderated. Suddenly comes the ultimate, a veritable monty, the that as seen from the Col, "the whole valley at our feet was all-time mother of king-size mega-avalanches. This one is not completely filled by a glacier occupying an area of about five only heard but seen. A cloud ofi ice-powder explodes around the square miles. They made a perilous and laborious descent", corner of the lake, followed seconds later by floating chunks of crossed the glacier, walked out to the Arawata and returned to glacier. Wait for the tsunami. Here it is, a half metre wave Otago the same way. The Matukituki-Waipara crossing was not which transforms the lake outlet into an uncrossable torrent. repeated until 1940, by which time the Bonar had retreated and Yesterday we could paddle across. Today, unfortunately, our Hector's route was cut off. route lies on the other side. However, within a few seconds the water drops, and drops, until the Upper Waipara is almost dry. A slanting rib of rock bars our way. Grant tries a route to the Then another flood, followed by another withdrawal. The lake left, while the others debate alternatives. Harry goes for a direct is sloshing back and forth the way your bath does when you get assault, to which John takes exception because he knows he in quickly at one end. We watch, timing the oscillations, which can't follow. It there's one moment of disharmony on the trip, have a 100-second period and show no signs of abating. Then, this is it. "The idea of tramping in a group," says John, "is so like the Israelites crossing the Red Sea, we make a dash for it you can move together and help one another. If we're not going at low tide. to do that, we might as well go on solo Christmas trips," he says. "That doesn't mean we each have to stand on the exact We explore around the corner of the lake, which now carries same bit of ground,' " says Harry. In a huff, John dumps his pack enough icebergs to resemble a miniature Ross Sea. John's and follows below the rib, up and to the right, to a saddle camera packs up and he swears it's the last second-hand one overlooking the Binnacle. Its his one and only route-finding he'll buy. If we're to impress the folks back at club, everything coupe in twelve days. Three assemble there; and Grant appears now depends on Harry's Minolta. twenty minutes later having had, as he puts it, some strife.

This place is mind-blowing. We look across the valley to Barff, Athene, Ionia and Eros, and way down the Waipara, which appears beguilingly innocent in the sunshine. Around us is a profusion of alpine shrubs in flower; while alongside, the terminus of the glacier spills over rock slabs like a too-generous serving ofi ice-cream. There's no wind. This is Alpine Calendar stuff, folks. All is forgiven. A switchback snowgrass ridge leads us on. Its narrow in places, and when John gets frightened Grant sends him ahead to boost his confidence. As we gain height the view expands, and photo stops are frequent. Dead ahead (but three miles away). Aspiring, pure and white against the sky, is now just above a foreground ofice and rock. The ridge stops abruptly at a recently glaciated schist surface, clean and dry with layers of quartz in it. Rubber soles grip perfectly, and there's no energyl loss: from every step up we get one hundred percent return.. Just walking on this stuff is so much fun it's almost a hardship to stop for lunch but we do, where the slope eases and a runnel of melt water comes down to fill the billy. Harry starts his fifth roll of 36. At around 3 pm the slope eases. We're at the edge of the glacier. A thousand feet up and half a mile away, insect-like humans disport themselves around Colin Todd Hut. They're the first people we've seen since somebody waved to us from Pearson saddle eight days ago. We've been carrying crampons all this time; and at last we need them, for all of fifty metres before the ice is overlain by snow. Descending the Quarterdeck (Harry Smith) Harry remembers, fortunately, all the necessary knots. We set off in line astern, festooned with harness and rope, like Scott's There's a well-trodden schrund to cross as we begin the descent polar party minus the sledges. What if someone goes down a ofl French Ridge. Where the slope eases we unrope and remove crevasse? wonders John. They're only small, says Grant. Don't the harnesses which have been dangling uncomfortably round worry, says Harry. our thighs like advertisements for the kind of underpants not to buy. Freedom! The next several hours pass inexorably slowly. Mid afternoon in midsummer is not a preferred time for glacier travel. With The trip is almost over. Some choose to linger, taking in the each step the males sink in halfway up their calves, and Karen view of the Matukituki and an endless sea of darkening peaks, sinks in all the way. John is sent to the front to locate crevasses, and the notch of Hector's Col now seen from its Otago side. which he does repeatedly and unerringly by plunging through From here it's all downhill. Every step takes us closer to streets into them even when, accordingt to Grant, the signs are obvious. and traffic and offices and desks and cuts in government He reminisces aloud about his last visit here, 23 years ago, expenditure. hoping to impress the others with his extreme longevity and antiquity. At 9 am we make camp outside French Ridge Hut, which is full of sleeping climbers with ambitions for tomorrow. Our own The travel is all uphill and tedious. The glacier is gently convex ambitions are sated. Karen, nobly forgiving us for having driven so our horizon retreats continuously and the only indicator of her at speed past so much good scenery, cooks the dinner. A progress is to take a fix on the lowest part of Mt. French that is head pops out of a nearby Olympus. Its Neil Hickman, last of presently visible above the bulge, then look again ten minutes the Hutt Valleys to leave. They've had a soggy time in the later to see how much more has been revealed. Or else one can snow-cave, but some good climbs. keep an eye on the south-west ridge ofMt. Aspiring, knowing that when past it we shall have made nearly two thirds of our 4J January, late. The H.V.T.C. truck takes us past the camp at distance. At intervals our Canadian ambassador sends up the line Glendhu Bay, Lake Wanaka, where caravans and tents are terse diplomatic communiques about disparities in stride length crammed together with little fences around them to give some between herself and Kiwi males, who (she complains) expect privacy and keep the dogs out. We try very hard not to feel everyone to be 7 feet tall. superior, and fail. Harry starts his sixth roll of 36. The team: At last we creep under the lengthening shadow of Mt. French, #1 Karen Serjeanston wounded in the side by the recently abandoned snow-cave ofthe #2 Grant Wheaton (leader) Hutt Valley alpine party. Not until 7.30 pm is all our climbing #3 Harry Smith done. We're on the Main Divide, the quarterdeck of Mt. #4. John Rhodes (scribe). Aspiring, passingt the time of day with a Dunedin couple who've set up camp here. This is almost suburban.