Tags
Aspiring National Park, Fiery Col, Five Passes, Hidden Falls Creek, Lake Nerine, New Zealand, North Col, Olivine Ledge, Park Pass, Rock Burn, Route Burn North Branch, Sony A7RII
In my last post, I described the first part of a tramp around the Five Passes route, an epic off-track route in New Zealand’s Mount Aspiring Park; while the first three days had delivered patchy weather, we had spent the fourth day hunkered down in a small bivvy under a house-sized boulder while the rain hammered down and previously dry water-courses on the nearby mountain slopes thundered with water. Fortunately, as the fourth night progressed the sounds of water dripping around the edges of our little shelter gradually diminished, and when I poked my head out at 6.30 in the morning, the first signs of clearing weather could be seen blowing in from the south. Impatiently I roused the others out of their sleeping bags and we began to ready ourselves for the day. Breakfasts were downed, damp gear was sorted and bundled into packs, and the route was sorted for the day – along the Olivine Ledge, over Fiery Col with its dramatic ultramafic rocks, around the boggy wetlands of Cow Saddle, and down into the head of Hidden Falls Creek where we would find our next campsite.
