We peered down into the clag. Below us, the slope seemed to disappear into an abyss of hideous bluffs and gullies. Above us, the steep snow slopes and rocky bluffs soared upwards, disappearing out of sight into the thick, enveloping clag.
Which way should we head? If we continued upwards, would we reach our goal, the invisible ridgeline far above? Or would we find ourselves bluffed, with no option but to turn around and retreat, to follow our own tracks back down the mountainside?
We kept sidling left and upwards, gaining height, following the line of least resistance, an upward-leading band of slightly wider-spaced contours on the map. On the map they looked ok, but here on the ground the reality was steep snow slopes, bluffs and gullies. Visibility was down to 20 metres in the gloom. Suddenly a deep gully loomed ahead of us, seemingly baring further onward progress. But we had to cross it if we wished to keep sidling. We ummed and ahhed, then set off carefully cramponing downwards – only to find that the steepness was deceptive in the clag and it was an easy slope after all.
We continued to pick our way forward. Then we came to a hideous ravine, blocking our route completely. The sound of a large waterfall could be heard, roaring invisibly in the murky depths below us. We turned upwards. More bluffs and snow bands followed. We sidled across a steep, rocky slope, still gaining height.
Finally we found ourselves on the broad ridgeline. A quick rest, then we headed off to the right into the murk, compasses out to check direction. The ridge narrowed and began climbing. We found ourselves in rocky scrambling. And the weather worsened. Earlier, down on the mountainside, it had been clagged in, but otherwise not too unpleasant. Now the wind set in.
Up ahead the map showed a major ridge junction. We checked our compasses carefully; we didn’t want to get it wrong.
We swung left, then right. We passed a high point, then the ridgeline began to slope downwards. We couldn’t see anything in the murk beyond the narrow ridgeline we were on but it felt like a knife-edge. Off to the left there was the feeling of vertical slopes, of huge, unplumbed depths. Off to the right felt like blank, like nothingness. Maybe there was something out there, maybe just infinite space. We stuck carefully to the ridge, keeping in the safety of a narrow furrow between the rocky ridgecrest itself and a deep bank of hardened snow, placing crampons and iceaxe carefully.
Finally the slopes eased off into a plateau on the right, and the ridgeline terminated in a rocky knoll. This was the spot we were after. This was where the map showed we had to drop off.
We peered down into the depths below us. It looked steep – steeper than I had expected. But there was nothing for it, so we picked our way carefully down. The slope was hard with small amounts of loose rock and scree on top – a dangerous combination. Rocks bounced downwards, dislodged by our feet. For a short section it was so steep that I sat down and slid down on the seat of my pants for better traction. But then it eased off, and we could plunge-step down with ease. I relaxed; the slope was fine, we were nearly there. There were no more difficulties, we were going to make it OK. A small notch briefly provided more scambling before the ridge levelled off and broadened once again.
And now we began to catch glimpses through the gloom, glimpses of lake water and icebergs far below us. We swung left and trudged down broad slopes, then picked our way down broad rock ramps and rounded rock faces. Suddenly the clouds parted and we caught a glimpse of a hut, perched on a level rocky terrace in the distance, sillouetted against the dull greyness of cloud filling the valley beyond. But before I could get my camera out the sight had gone, retreating into the enveloping clag once more.
At last we reached the lake shore. Now there was only one obstacle left – the lake outlet channel. At our feet a swift torrent of water raced down a rocky channel before plunging off over a series of cascades and waterfalls. If you got swept away in that your chances of survival would be slim. There was no hope of crossing where we were, so we made our way to the very top of the channel, beside the lake itself. Here the lake waters slowly drained forward, gathering speed before being syphoned off down the plug hole. Icebergs floated on the lake waters, eerie, white, and silent. In the distance the Ivory Glacier vanished upwards into the clag. Small chunks of ice in the water would slowly, ever so slowly, gravitate their way forwards towards the outlet, inperceptibly gaining speed before finally being sucked into the syphon and bobbing off down the tailrace, to vanish over the cascades in the distance.
The channel was narrow here, but still too wide to jump. And it was impossible to tell how deep it was. We tested the depth with our iceaxes and failed to find the bottom. We tried slightly further to the left, arcing out into the lake itself. Here it didn’t seem so bad. It would do – it would have to do. We linked up in pairs and stepped into the water, a sudden shock of cold. The bottom was smooth rock, potentially dangerous, but here the flow wasn’t too strong. We inched forward and clambered out the other side. We were across; the last obstacle had been passed.
We strolled the last hundred metres up to the hut, opened the door and stepped inside. Two people were in residence. They looked up as we entered, surprised by our sudden arrival. “Didn’t expect to see anybody arrive in this weather” they said.
Ivory Lake is the sort of place old trampers go to retire. (Yeah, I know, I flogged that sentence from an Adventure or Wilderness magazine article from two or three years ago, but I like it.) When your pack starts getting heavier and heavier, when you start to get creaky in the joints, when the thought of lying in a cramped, damp tent, unable to stand up or move around, starts to lose its appeal, the idea of a place where you can ease back in a comfortable armchair in a comfortable hut, while outside through the window a spectacular landscape of glacier, lake, and mountainside beckons, has an irresistible appeal. Ivory Lake is such a place, and now we had finally made it there. We began our trip on the West Coast, in the Mikinui, late in the afternoon after a long, windy drive in on the access road. From there it was an easy hour or so up river to Mikonui Flat hut, where we spent the first night. The next day we followed the track to Truran Pass, then up onto the end of Dickie Spur. Heavy packs and steep terraine led to slow travel, and we were glad to reach Dickie Spur Hut for the night. Hunty’s name appeared in the logbook from many years before.
From Dickie Spur we had two choices of route. The original plan was to go along Dickie Ridge onto the Tusk, then along Sawtooth Ridge before dropping off down to Ivory Lake. A variant of this option would have been to turn off before the Tusk and go via Ragged peak, Top Waitaha, and Stag Creek. But conditions on the day were clagged in, and we had heard that Dickie Ridge and Sawtooth Ridge were tricky in places, so we opted instead for the alternative route, to drop into the upper Tuke river and go via Top Tuke hut, climbing out again at the head of the valley onto the ridgeline behind the lake.
From the shallow saddle at the start of Dickie Ridge we dropped into the creek which provides the one easy access route down through the otherwise almost inpenetrable bluffs which guard the top of the Tuke, sidling out to the right through thick scrub towards the bottom before we hit the maelstrom of the Tuke gorge.
We kept on the true left of the river because it looked the easiest travel. Top Tuke hut was on the other side of the river but we didn’t anticipate any trouble crossing further up. But then the rain set in, and by the time we got up opposite the hut the river had come up so much we couldn’t even cross the next side stream, let alone the main river. We were stuck, completely stuck. We scratched two miserable tent platforms out of the hillside and sat there for two nights waiting for the rivers to go down. The hut was only two hundred metres away, but absolutely, totally, utterly out of reach. Fortunately it was out of sight, hidden beyond a slight rise in the ground; to have actually been able to see it from the tent door would have been simply too depressing.
Two mornings later we awoke to find that the sun was shining and the river had dropped. We waded across to check out the hut, then carried on up valley, through fields of tussock and spaniards. Ivory Lake was just up over the intervening range. But what started as a good day deteriorated, and we soon found ourselves blundering around in the clag. It was many hours later, after finding our way to the ridgeline, navigating around the tops, descending to the lake, and crossing the outlet, that we finally reached our destination.
In basic appearance Ivory Lake Hut is a standard old six-bunk hut from the Forest Sevice days. Dozens, probably hundreds, of them lie scattered throughout the back country, where DOC has not yet let them fall to pieces through lack of maintenance or replaced them with hideous Lockwood monstrosities. They are all standard, all of unvarying design. But in the case of Ivory Lake hut things are slightly different.
The hut was put in back in the sixties, as a base for glaciological research. That research program is now over but the hut remains and signs of its former use abound. Out the back, marking the hut off from the ordinary, is a lean-to shed full of bits of abandoned gear – lengths of wood and metal, oil drums and metal glacier markers, test-tubes and rotting research papers.
Inside, the hut has a cosy feel to it, with varnished wall panellings and semi-round finishings. There is a large solid wooden table with drawers in the middle of the floor. And perhaps most famously, there is an armchair. Photos of happy retired trampers slothing contentedly in the armchair in the sun beside the lake are considered de rigueur.
The hut is perched on the edge of Ivory Lake cirque, on a flat rock terrace worn smooth and clear by ancient glacial action, 100 metres from the lake itself and about 3 metres from the crest of a vertical drop into Stag Creek far below. A more perfect site for aged trampers to retire and sloth, to veg out in the sun and reminisce about the good old day before young upstarts with their Camelbacks and Petzel headlamps and plunger coffee mugs appeared on the scene, would be hard to imagine.
Our first morning at Ivory Lake dawned clear and fine. It turned out that we had seen the last of the bad weather for the whole trip. Slothing was the order of the day, though we salved our consciences by doing some maintenance on the hut (and I thereby justified to myself my failure to have a hut pass). We cleaned up the junk in the shed out the back and burnt a heap of rotting rubbish. We covered over a broken window which rain had been coming through, rotting the inside corner of the hut. We even fixed up the wobbly leg of the famous hut armchair – before reclining back in it in the sun.
The big event of the day was the arrival of the chopper with the food drop. Yes, a food drop. Oh, the shame of it all! But when packs are heavy and hills are steep, retired trampers can develop sufficiently flexible morals that they can adjust themselves to such new-fangled methods. And if a hut was already there, blotting the landscape, what could possibly be wrong with a food drop?
Unfortunately a slight mix-up with dates – it seemed Grant had told them February instead of January! – meant that our food drop wasn’t actually there to meet us when we arrived. Grant got on the mountain radio and checked out what the story was, and later in the day the chopper thundered in from the valley below. Large barrels of food were off-loaded and the chopper departed. We opened the barrels like eager children on Christmas morning and examined the contents. Packets of this, jars of that, tins of the other all miraculously poured forth.
And of course New Year’s day would not be complete without fireworks. And since we had the luxury of a chopper drop we could have the luxury of real fireworks. Grant had packed a suitable supply of pyrotechnics the size of beer flagons, and the chopper had groaned under the weight. When it got dark we lugged them outside, set fire to the touch paper, and retreated a suitable distance. Flashes and shockwaves echoed around the basin, and broken windows were reportedly recorded in Hokitika.
Next day guilty consciences began whispering, telling us we had to do something, so we went off on a day trip to climb Park Dome. We dropped down, crossed Stag Creek, and followed the leading spur up the other side of the valley. Great views of Ivory Lake unveiled themselves on the way up but unfortunately cloud came in and covered the top of the peak just as we arrived there, so the spectacular views we had expected of Mt Evans and the Bracken Snowfield did not eventuate. We returned to the hut for another session of eating and relaxing in the sun.
We had planned to leave the following day but as the dawn broke the pleasantness of the surroundings – and abundant supplies of food – persuaded us that we could plausibly justify to ourselves staying an extra day. The excuse would be a day trip back the way we had come, back up the ridge behind the lake and along to Mt Beaumont. Good weather and light day packs magically eased the steepness and difficulty which had seemed to exist on the day we arrived, and the ridge now seemed simple and straightforward. Unfortunately the weather repeated its pattern of the previous days, clagging in once again part way along to Beaumont, and little more excuse was required to persuade us to flag the venture and return to the hut for more lazying in the sun and pigging out on food.
Well, all good things must come to an end, and after three days of slothing, eating, and side trips it was time to leave. We crammed as much food into our packs as we could manage, stashed the left-over pancake mix, chocolate cakes, camembert cheeses, Macintosh toffees, steam puddings and wine bottles into a barrel in the corner, and placed a sign on top saying “help yourself!”. A week or two later, no doubt, some poor, scrawny, malnourished tramper, skinny as a rake from nibbling on nothing but muesli and cabin bread for days, would fall on our left-over food bin with a shriek of joy like manna from heaven.
We headed up to the head of Stag Creek and peered over Seddon Saddle. The other side, we had heard, could be difficult. This had been a matter of some concern for the whole trip up to this point. Would we manage to get down, or would we have to find some totally different route out?
A steep snow slope seemed to offer a possible route, so we set off down, placing crampons with studied care. To our right, a steep, icy chute plunged down for hundreds of feet at a near vertical angle. The slope we were on swung around to the left, out of sight. There, a steep rock ramp revealed itself, leading down through the bluffs. We clambered down and out onto the glacier below. Our worries were over.
We stopped for lunch in the basin in the head of the valley, trying to escape the furnace-like heat of the midday sun by hiding under the slight rim of an overhanging boulder. Man the heat! Then it was off down the valley for an afternoon of pleasant scrambling and boulder hopping. A final nasty scrub-bash brought us to the vicinity of Agfa Knob and the Wilkinson glacial lake, and our proposed campsite on a small triangle of flat land marked on the map. Unfortunately what we had perhaps optimistically envisaged being a pleasant well-kempt lawn turned out to be a tangle of scrub and boulders, but we searched around and found a spot which, with a bit of judicious pruning of scrub and levering of rocks, was big enough to pitch two tents, separated by a large vertical boulder.
Still, if the campsite left something to be desired we could certainly not complain about the scenery. This is an amazing place, wild and rugged, seldom visited by man. Before you lies the Wilkinson glacial lake, cold and bleak, uninviting in its rugged rocky basin. Behind lies the crumbling face of Katzenbach Ridge, leading up to the glacial rim of the Bracken Snowfield. Johnny Pascoe used this as a route onto the Bracken in the 1930’s but gaining access onto the ridgetop looked awful to me. Towering over everything, tall and aloof and proud, are the bluffs and crags, the hanging glaciers and rockfaces, of Mt Evans.
The area also has more keas than I have ever come across anywhere before. At one point I counted 19 of them lined up in a row on the ridgeline behind our camp, like arrays of indians in a western, massing for the attack. Suddenly they all launched into the air and performed an amazing, swirling, screeching aerial ballet.
The next day was the day I had been dreading. Back in December when I had told Struan what we were planning to do, he had looked at me with that mixture of incredulity and pity which one reserves for the severely hydroencephalitic, shook his head in sorrow, and declared flatly, “you’re mad, absolutely mad.” Now we were to find out what he meant.
Someone glancing casually at the map may have some difficulty understanding what all the fuss was about. The distance between us and the Whitcombe river was only about 2 or 3 kilometres – an easy, pleasant morning stroll, surely? Unfortunately in that 2 or 3 km the river drops nearly 300 metres, is full of large boulders, and is in the scrub zone. Anybody familiar with Westland tramping will know what that means.
To cut a long story short, it took us until the middle of the afternoon before we finally reached the junction with the Whitcombe, after travelling all of two kilometres from Agfa Knob. We had clambered over boulders, through scrub, around boulders, under scrub. I was scratched and irritable, my nerves were frayed, and I had torn both iceaxe attachments from my pack. But that was ok, we were finally out of there, we were finally on flat land, the scrub was behind us, the track was just across the other side of the river, we would just nip across and we would be out of this jungle of man-eating scrub….
Damn!! The river was simply uncrossable. Bugger!! This simply wasn’t fair!! Nature could play it tough, fair enough, that was perfectly reasonable, expected even, but this was simply dirty cheating! I blundered up and down the short section of open flats we were on like a madman, cursing this poxy hellhole and seaching for a crossing point, but everywhere I looked it just seemed too swift, too deep, too bouldery. You might make it, you might not; it simply wasn’t worth the risk. So there was no option but to take to the hillside and the bush and scrub once again and bash down-river to the swingbridge.
And even there nature conspired to play a trick. As I approached from up-river the bridge appeared to end high up in a rocky outcrop. Obviously the way up was round the back. I set off in that direction and soon found myself caught in the confines of a narrow rocky ravine, jammed in by my pack. But my goal was in sight and nothing was going to stop me now! I took my pack off, threw it ahead, and clambered up after it with the manic energy of a prisoner who has sighted freedom. Damn once again! The bridge didn’t go all the way into the rocky outcrop after all, but terminated instead on a high wooden platform. A large gap yawned between it and where I stood! Well I wasn’t backtracking now, that was for sure. If nature could play it tough then so could I. An overhanging branch appeared to offer a way across. I performed a complicated gymnastic manouvre and swung myself onto the platform. Meanwhile Max had calmly walked around the river bank underneath the bridge and climbed up onto the plaform with the help of the ladder which was thoughtfully provided there!
We spent the night at Neave Hut, a few kilometres back up the track from the bridge. Now we were in easy country. Next morning we headed up the track and rambled over the open top of Whitcombe Pass, at 1239 metres surely one of the lowest and easiest crossing points anywhere throughout the length of the Southern Alps. We stopped for lunch in the sun beside a pleasant tarn just down the other side of the pass, and I pottered around taking photographs of mountain flowers. After the scrub-filled hell of the lower Wilkinson this was paradise. Then we headed out down Louper Stream, untracked but easy, pleasant, open travel. Eventually we arrived at the Rakaia.
The route out was down the other side of the river. That was easy travel; I had done it twice before. But first we had to get to the other side, and unfortunately the river was up. Between us and the far bank lay a thundering serpent of water. We first tried directly opposite Louper stream, which seemed like a good spot because the river was broken up into four channels. We linked up and forced our way across the first three, only to find that we couldn’t cross the last one, so we had to force our way back across the first three.
Carrying on down the true left, we kept an eye out for a suitable crossing point. After a kilometre or two we came upon a place where the river, although still one big channel, was spread out over a large distance. “We’ll try here” said Grant. We linked up and stepped into the current. Within a few metres we had gone in over chest deep. “Back out” cried Grant. “I think that was just an unlucky deep spot” declared Grant when back on dry land again, somewhat optimistically I thought. “Let’s try again a few metres down stream.” So we linked up again a few metres downstream. “Stay linked up and keep going!” cried Grant. We set off into the water, we stayed linked up, and we kept going. Like an unstoppable express train we emerged safe and sound on the other side.
We continued on down the four wheel drive track until we found a suitable campsite. Next day was our last day on the trip. The river was still high, in close around the base of the bluffs above Lake [?] Stream, so we had to take the old four-wheel drive road up over the hillside. A series of steep washouts blocked the way, forcing us to scamble precariously across or climb high around them through the scrub. Then it was a trudge back down the road to the farm station. The sun was swelteringly hot and the road seemed to go on forever. Finally we reached the waiting vehicle – to be greeted with strawberries and icecream!! What a way to end a great trip!