Mt Arrowsmith was the challenge. All 2,781 metres of her on the Main Divide west of Ashburton. Steve Reeves pulled out on the eleventh hour due to straining his back at Rock ‘n’ Roll dance classes. The group was now down to eight with Joe Fraser (leader), Tony Reeves, Charlie Batho, Andrew Downes, Simon Wakeman, Mark Ryan and Gabriel the Swede meeting Dave Garratt in Picton after a successful Mt Tappy ascent.
Gung-ho Joe had successfully climbed Mt Arrowsmith and Jagged Peak six years previously and recounted the story of Don French unroping on the glacier at night time to go to the toilet, falling down a crevasse and his climbing buddy thinking he’d buggered off without him so returned to the hut alone.
For our trip the seven hour drive south was broken by a pleasant café stop near Amberly for muffins and lattes – the last taste of civilisation for five days. But reality weighed us down at 1pm when full packs were donned with 50 metre ropes, harnesses, two ice axes each and plastics. The walk in was about 12km rising 500 metres in height over five hours, via copses of unavoidable madagouri, to Cameron hut perched on a moraine wall.
There were no views the first day as we walked towards the Main Divide with a front moving up the country. Those who wore plastics got them soaked. Those who wore glasses may well have been better wearing a diving mask. And Joe’s ligament, which was tender after a trip two weeks ago, became more aggravated to the point that it stopped him climbing in days to come. Tony arrived at the hut first for sake of warmth after last being seen wearing skimpy shorts and a purple wind sheeter. Everyone jumped into their sleeping bags to warm up before playing around with the hut’s solar light and “IB105” mountain radio. Mark gave us quotes from Bill Bryson’s “Notes from a large country” [America]; “Did you know that 136 people went to A&E last year after being cut while taking their clothes off … and did you know that 161,000 hackers successfully logged into the Pentagon computer …”.
Friday was windy but clear. Windy enough to whip up the recent snow fall into flurries of mobile avalanche whirl winds. Clear enough to witness the wonderful position of the hut among giant snow clad mountains, classical glaciers and crumbling moraine deposits. The “advanced” party left for Cameron glacier at 10am for a gentle reconnaissance while the renegade party meandered from the hut up to the same spot two hours later. It was possible to weaver a way through the crevasses and head up the valley to the right for a view looking back of Mt Arrowsmith. The recent snowfall had covered up some crevasses which Gabriel managed to get a leg stuck in and Simon managed to fall up to his waist in with legs kicking air below. In fact on the way out, Andrew walked straight into a crevasse despite Charlie’s protestations and needed to be extracted by pulling on an offered ice axe. Meanwhile, Gabriel and Tony plugged up the mountain to traverse the moraine wall back to the hut but got bluffed out and had to return the same way.
The hardest part of that Friday was Joe and Mark’s vegetable vindaloo curry with five fresh chilli’s and three “hot” packet sauces. As Joe poignantly pointed out; “It isn’t a hot curry until you start sweating under your eye brow – this is only hot in the mouth”. Friday night the winds picked up (both male flatulence and climatic features) and rain fell solidly for 15 hours (both watery eyes and climatic features).
Friday night merged with all day Saturday as eight frustrated guys sat in the hut for 48 hours looking for things to do; sleeping, reading (The Hobbitt, Bill Bryson, Filth, The Crimean War), prusikking from the ceiling, chess, Simon’s 45 minute walk / run in the rain for Coast to Coast training, Joe’s tiki tour of Europe via England’s back streets and charades (the Bible, the Matrix, Gulliver’s Travels, Willie Wonker and the Chocolate Factory, Bohemian Rhapsody and Love me Tender). Tony was the best at charades even though he was a closet player as he never moved from the top bunk all day except to challenge Mark to a version of Wimbledon hacky sack. Mark again flabbergasted us with quotes from Bill Bryson; ” Did you know that a Grandparent in Texas decided to sue Disney after Mickey Mouse took his head gear off in public and destroyed their Grandchildren’s belief in Disney characters”. The case was thankfully thrown out of court.
Two Cantabrian’s arrived soaked to the skin that afternoon. If they had been foreigners we would have convinced them we’d already booked the entire hut for the weekend. Alas no chance of foxing these two by the look of their 1960’s tramping equipment and clothes they possessed. The rain had now stopped and the nine man hut crowded with ten. With the mountain radio forecast at 7.30pm looking fine for the next few days came a host of options; Mt Arrowsmith but too much snow and avo risk ? Walk out and go to Hamner Springs ? Make it a round trip via Jagged Col ?
It was decided that Joe, Tony and Dave (whom Tony affectionately referred to as “The Hippie”) would walk out back to the cars. Mark, Gabriel, Simon, Charlie and Andrew would in two days climb up the Cameron Glacier, over Jagged Col (2,255 metres), down Jagged Glacier into the Rakaia and back to Lake Heron where Joe would meet us in his new 4WD Toyota at a pre arranged trig point no later than mid day on the Monday … in time to drive back to Picton for the 9.30pm ferry. “If it is a 4WD marked track on the map, I’ll make it” said Joe. “I may even drive over into the Rakaia to meet you the day before” he said. That was the plan. All went according to plan (more or less) apart from the 4WD pick up as you will read.
Sunday 4am there was a haze of mist in the valley which cleared to a full moon by 4.30am as the intrepid five started out – to avoid porridge style snow later in the day. Like a well trained pup, Charlie left the house and locked up, from the outside, accidentally locking Joe, Tony and Dave in the hut asleep ! As luck would have it Andrew forgot something and had to return to the hut to remedy the situation. Torches flashed like a concentration camp search light as we approached the glacial snout by 6am. Half way up the snout there was a particularly icy patch which required careful negotiation. By sun rise we were on the glacial plateau watching the freshly snow capped mountains turn a hazy shade of winter orange.
Compared to the reconnaissance mission two days previously there was an extra metre of powder snow and much more avalanche debris – one huge avalanche which happened right in the path of the previous days tracks. The Cameron Glacier was indeed one huge avalanche alley. When we finally stopped for a rest in the sun at 8am there were rocks and ice falling off the slopes vertically above us all the time. A most exposed place to stop but idyllic as the Gates of Heaven.
Mark and Gabriel decided to attempt Prop Peak (2,408 metres) up a steep head wall. Running belays up to the top presented them with a razor sharp arrete and so down climbed to follow Simon, Charlie and Andrew’s footsteps traversing to the right of the final crevasses to Jagged Col. Simon led for a long while and swapped with Andrew on the final stage. Charlie butterflied in the middle. “Wow. Wowwww” Andrew exclaimed as his upward strides near the top finally brought more and more into sight. Wow it was indeed. Cloudless on Cameron Glacier but drifting, moody cloud on Jagged Glacier side with glimpses down into the Rakaia River and the valley we were to follow to Banfield Hut.
11am on the col and the snow was more heavy. All were keen to get off the glacier even though we’d been moving for seven hours by mid morning already as the sun was burning hard directly on to Jagged Glacier. Descending a snow slope with three on a rope is somewhat more kangarooie than slowly plodding up a glacier. Charlie (in the middle) was being pulled forward and dragged back as Andrew’s and Simon’s speeds weren’t quite synchronised.
Life looked easy from here on in. We’d done the hard part – it was now only a progressive descent over four kilometres to Banfield Hut in the Rakaia to end the day, and then along a 4WD track to meet Joe the day after. This is what we thought. Life was good playing with the keas. However, little did we know it at the time but the adventure was only just beginning.
Jagged stream leading to Banfield Hut became larger and larger with more and more dense bush. No track existed. The stream grew quickly graduating into a white water river. Bluffs and dense bush forced us to scramble over boulders and cross the raging torrent. At times we had to sidle round boulders with the river below us. It required concentration and long finger nails to avoid falling into the water though Andrew did ask in a panicky voice “Charlie, Charlie, how deep is it ?” as he clung to a rock fearing at any moment he was going to lose a grip and fall heavily into the raging torrent below and be swept to oblivion, only to see Charlie walk through the water half way up his knees; “It’s this deep, Andrew” he said, pointing to his feet. Andrew and Gabriel teamed up well to cross the river. Andrew had to stand to Gabriel’s left for fear that Andrew’s arm may dislocate. “That’s good” said Gabriel, “because I need to stand on your right otherwise my arm may dislocate too”.
It also turned out to be one of the slowest bush bashes ever. More than three hours to cover the last two kilometres despite being able to see the floor of the Rakaia valley frustratingly close. On more than one occasion the mind played tricks turning three trees and a large boulder into an apparition of Joe, Dave and Tony beside their 4WD.
When we finally arrived at the hut is was 7.30pm – some fifteen hours after starting out (although a pleasant hour lunch was included in the time). The hut book went back to 1982 and we could see why. Who would want to stay in this shack ? Bunks consisted of literally a sack of potatoes style canvas (and equally as lumpy). Possum and mice poo were over the bunks. Cob webs were everywhere in the roof (it wasn’t a high roof !). Indeed Simon woke in the night in a cold sweat dreaming of a huge cob web above him – turned his head torch on – and there it was. But at least the billy stove went well and the moon shone bright.
Now we thought the adventure was over. Monday looked like an easy 4WD track that one could mountain bike up. Surely the trip couldn’t throw anything else at us. Wrong again. There were two HUGE slips that took the entire 4WD traverse road away. Shame on Joe for not getting this far ! Never mind, he’d only be a short distance away. The slips created a 70 degree slope with 100 metres air below you. Even Gabriel, who goes off ski touring with Phil Kendon, didn’t like it ! It was one of these situations where it takes you a few minutes to psyche yourself up to put your first boot onto the slip and pray you don’t slide downwards. We very nearly had to get the 50 metre rope out and belay across. But what is amazing is that Mark completed the entire last day in a pair of tevas !
By 11am we were at Downs Hut and kept a beady eye on Joe and his 4WD. We’d made it. We waited. We listened. No car. No Joe. No. By noon we accepted the fact that Joe’s 4WD couldn’t cut it in the countryside ! We now had an extra 6km to walk to the stock bridge which put the 9.30pm ferry sailing in jeopardy. If we got to the stock bridge, SURELY Joe could reach that point by 4WD ? No Joe. Things were bad – ANOTHER 6km to walk out. No chance of catching the ferry now. But when the chips were down, Andrew, being English, suggested we sit down and have a cup of tea since we’d never catch the ferry anyway. We toyed with scenarios of why Joe hadn’t been there waiting for us; Was he still locked in the hut thanks to Charlie ? Had he pulled a ligament and had to be carried out by Dave and Tony ? Had they eloped to Hamner Springs and got meningitis ?
Our next target was 5km away where the copse of trees protected the farming hamlet. SURELY Joe could make that point ? The walk across the farmers land was easy although there was a slight marshy area with stream running through the middle. We even picked up a herd of cows as they followed Andrew for the last kilometre and shied away when he turned to face them. At last, Simon’s car in sight, but not Joe’s. The message on the car from Joe said; “Got stuck in the first stream. Gone to Ashburton for oil change etc”. The real story is that Joe went onto the farmers land, got stuck in the first stream so much so that for two hours the water poured over the door and flooded the floor boards, couldn’t be pulled out by Dave and Tony, nor another 4WD, and had to rely on the farmer (none too happy !) using his winch system on the farm tractor.
Simon’s car nearly required an oil change as well as we sped down the dirt road at 90kmph with stones flying up at the under carriage. Mobile calls to Joe and partners found out the whole story. And Sarah’s reply to the fact we’d missed the ferry was; “How can you be late, Charlie, you’ve had five days to walk out !”. And that was that; Mark acted as car DJ Meggawattie with the CD playing Abba as a tribute to Gabriel and in Christchurch a Pizza Hut ‘eat all you can’ went down well except the directions from the locals saying “Just keep on walking, you’ll find it”.
We finally caught the 5.30am Tuesday morning sailing. One thing can be certain about this trip; There were too many uncertainties – but exquisite countryside. Thanks Joe.