Slabs daywalk

Slabs duy*alk lnspired by a daywalk in January 2OO2 above Lake Douglas and the following rainy afternoon at Horace Walker Hut.

The sound of the helicopter dies off behind the moraine wall just as quickly as it emerg a few minutes ago. With it goes a group of hunters and with them they take their prey Thar and Chamois. The sweet smell of raw meat around the hut and the accompany big black buzzing flies already seem to be fading too. We are alone again, apart fro the survivors in the hills - who must all be breathing sighs of reli< e mist around the craggy tops that encircle our valley is just as persistent as the background sound of boulder-hopping turbid water that fills this valley, barricaded to the west by West Coast bush that only reluctantly lets anyone pass through and to the east by the island's spine, the Main Divide.

We decide to go for an exploratory daywalk rather than navigate our way through the inside of another cloud while carrying all our treasured belongings. Thus, we can leave most of our gear to rest and look forward to another night of relative comfort in the hut.

So off we wander, off to the shores of the still and mighty lake. Silty grey, itshetches from the crevassed glacier to where the river starts with a few gentle swirls before leaping the first boulders, bordered by precipitous cliffs on both sides. A couple of disoriented seagulls have made one little rock protruding from the smooth greyness of the water their home. They must be hungry - or do they fare better than the couple of Aucklanders lamenting their lack of fishing luck in the hut book? That book with wellthumbed pages and dirty edges that is eagerly consulted upon each arrival for clues about the subsequent steps in the physical journey, and on whose advice we too, are travelling today.

Onwards along the lakeshore we meander towards some waterfalls that appear to emerge out of nowhere from above some of those cliffs confining the lake. Somewhere up behind there both map and hut book tell us to venture - it seems hard to believe with those clouds lingering relentlessly. But the promise of finding the source of these slender waterfalls prompts us to start the steep ascent up the loose gravel. Up we go, up past gravel and boulders, up past clear water trickles that become cloudy with our steps, up past dislodged tussock and uprooted grass, up past black mats of roots looking like the rugged neck hair of some troll, up towards the mouth of those waterfalls. Around another boulder and suddenly the horizon jumps a long way back and a highway of sorts opens up: a long polished slab of slate with avery even incline leading straight into the mist that occasionally lifts just enough to allow a glimpse of some menacingly blue ice-cliffs.

We can choose from a green band of rock or a red one: one for going up and one for going down? One if you have goods to declare when you enter the kingdom of mists, the

GabrielOssenka other for those who don't? A compromise is struck I following the little gorge gouged out by patiently flowir water just where the two lanes meet. One foot on ea colour with the leaping water in between. Normally rr and green don't mix to form gold, but this is neverthele the golden middle way. As the feet become accustomed the feel of the rock, and the surprising grip of our bo soles on the smooth slate we grow bolder. The pace upwar is increased: breathing, stepping, breathing and aga moving the other foot. We can go even faster and the sl is long enough. Sweat starts building and soon wet patch form on my rhythmically breathing stomach. It stains n thin shirt into two dark spots, looking like a pair of accusi eyes: You smelll

The creek makes an acrobatic jump over the top of or boulder that put itself in its way. Maybe it will be split the water one day, just as has happened on the overhangi precipice beside us, where the water seems to run insi the rock? In other places on these looming walls the wal truly appears to make a mockery of the laws of physics simply springs out in a merry arc from the middle of t rock face, jumping into the void bolder than any bun jumper as if to accentuate its pleasure with disobedien<

Or is the mountain crying?

The creek jumping acrobatically over that boulder loc like a garden fountain and is of suitable height and flow make it a shower. Is this an option for getting rid of tho accusing eyes? | approach, drink a few handfuls of t sparkling water and let it flow down my dry throat. T pain of chill in my forehead quickly convinces me tha have to smell for the time being. At least this water r, soon enter my arteries, circulate inside me and both folk me and allow me to continue up against where it car from. Thus I become part of the mountain and tl mountain becomes part of me. We share the same lifeblo - just that it pulsates with different heartbeats: tl mountain's according to the rhythm of floods and drough and mine according to the speed up the mountain. So r are blood brothers of sorts. Is this to be thinking like mountain?

The raucous call of a hang-gliding kea rapid approaching us as little colourful specks on this truly ban, slab, wakes me up. It circles us, chooses a rock that loo better than all the others for reasons onlv known to its

Tramping and Mountaineering 2OO7/2 nkamp nerged )rey of enying rtfrom t relief.

ruck by flowing ln each ally red rtheless rmed to ur boot Lpwards I again lhe slab patches ins my ccusing l of one split by ranging r inside e water ysics: it r of the bungy lience.

and starts an incessant cacophony. Is this the traffic police accusing us of speeding? Or are we using the wrong lane? A customs officer? The accusing calls of the kea can hardly be called welcoming, so that can't be it either. We look at each other but do not understand. Maybe it is laughing at our clumsy attempts to scale this slab, or asking if we don't wish we had wings like it? I quietly agree that would be most useful for the knee-jarring descent that must come. When it fails to attract any more attention the kea leaves us as suddenly as it arrived and the previous atmosphere of a slight chill is restored.

zr looks flow to ,f those of the rt. The z that I ter will Lfollow t came rd the eblood ts: the rughts,

Refreshed by the water and the interlude by the kea we continue onwards, upwards. The level under which the clouds do not bother to sink, the clag-line, is approaching rapidly. I leave the creek and pick a line through a crack in the slate and follow it. A crack through history, following untold stories of life and death in some ancient ocean. The iridescent greenish rock with its sweeping waw whites and interlacing patterns appears almost psychedelic when looking straight down at it while panting upwards - just right for the final steps up.

So we like a apidly barren t looks o itself

The presence of the mist is now tangible as a definite chill in the air. Today the clag-line, some distance above

1/2002

Tramping and Mountaineering 2001 /2002

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AD the bush-line on the other side of the valley, must coincide with the lunch-line!

We sit down on the cold rock as some mist swirls around us. I count out my ration of nuts, raisins and fruits dried in some far-away much sunnier place. Some more mountainblood to wash it down with and to reinforce our relationship. A slow trickle of cold air flowing from the misty abodes behind and above us reminds us that we can only be guests here. A glance over the shoulder proves the creeping suspicion that mist is closing in on us. Below our feet lies the long, straight and smooth slab, steel-grey and silent in the diffuse light.

We pack up our things and start our journey back. No, today's trip did not reveal any of the secrets of those blue towers of ice that must once have scoured and polished this glorious slab. They simply remain hidden in the mist.

This was merely part of one day on a trip of Jo McKenzie, Andrew Mclellan, Stuart Palmer and myself, starting up the Karangarua River to Lake Douglas and Horace Walker Hut via Red Deer Col, and up onto the Douglas N6v6 via the slab described, to camp at Welcome Pass and a finaldescent into the Copland Valley via Scott Creek in early January 2002.