Friday
Every time I walk the Barra Track I make a big deal of telling everyone who will listen about how much I dislike it. Yet once again, I found myself walking it – this time by head torch on a Friday evening – which of course made it take even longer than usual. We were on our Way to Mitre Flats Hut for the night.
It wasn’t until after 11 pm that we passed the last unmarked stream on our walk that evening and arrived at the Hut. We immediately clambered into our sleeping bags.
Saturday
Everything felt a bit better the next morning as we started up the Barton Track towards Baldy (a peak on the Tararua Range at 1325m elevation). We made really good time along the sidle track and the steep climb to Baldy. Above the bushline we were met with a chilling breeze, so we sheltered from the wind on the lee slope just below South King. We were adorned with jackets and gloves. Matt was the only one who found the motivation to bag the peak.
To get to Dorset Ridge, we followed the ridge about 50m south and then dropped down the spur on the other side of the ridge. The wind soon died away, which was a relief. Our hearts grew three sizes when we found an extremely well marked permolat track at the bushline, which took us down to Dorset Stream, and to yet another permolat track up the other side.
The climb up to Dorset Ridge Hut was well trodden, but less well marked (and quite steep). At one point near the top, there is a nice flat section followed immediately by a humorously steep push (we had noticed two suspiciously close contour lines on the topo map in advance, so at least this wasn’t a surprise).
We arrived at Dorset Ridge Hut at 4.45 pm. It was easy to make the decision to stay the night at Dorset Ridge Hut, rather than pushing on to Tarn Ridge Hut. For dinner we had an obscene amount of couscous, and for dessert, a melted block of chocolate which we dunked biscuits in.
Sunday
On Sunday we woke to a frost, so it was fortunate that we had an uphill slog to the Dorset Ridge line to start the day (but not everyone may agree with this assessment!).
With another chilly breeze, we headed towards Tarn Ridge, where we followed the steep narrow ridge to get to Girdlestone Peak and Mitre Peak. At this point some downhill travel was welcome and we breezed down to Mitre Flats Hut. We then completed our hike by heading out via the Barra Track (in a record 2.5 hour push).