Day 36: Stone hut to the Rangitata

The sun was out, a blue sky day. It would be another scorcher. We lazily departed Stone hut around 10:00 to start the climb up to the next saddle, at 1540 m. The gradient was gradual enough most of the way, though the sun made sure to leave us sweating all the same. On the way we came across a Te Araroa runner, she was attempting to beat the women's speed supported record, and finish in under 60 days. Emma had just been reading an article about her back in Tekapo. Brooke Thomas was her name, an ex-rower who had to give it up due to a heart condition. She was doing it to raise money for the Heart Kids charity. She would be doing the whole Two Thumbs section all the way from Rangitata to Tekapo today, a 70–80 km section that would take us 3 days to complete. We would later find out that she was successful in beating the record, completing her thru-run in 57 days.

The track got a little steeper approaching the last few hundred meters up to the saddle, breaking out of the tussocks and on to a scree slope. But it was well worn, which made things easy.

We were treated with an easy walk down off of the other side, heading on toward Crooked Spur, and the hut of the same name. We came across a few more TA SOBOs here who had come in on the same shuttle as Brooke, the runner. She was well ahead of them, and making good time.

Continuing down the saddle we peeked out around the mountains to our north to gain a view down the valley. There we could see the mighty Rangitata river which we've decided to attempt a foot crossing of.

Shortly after we reached the hut, where we stopped for lunch. We stopped for a yarn with the last of the day's SOBOs enroute. They were a little off the pace of the others, but then at 69 years old they were doing just fine. It was a long, slow climb up for the SOBO's to reach the saddle, and he was taking his time.

From the hut we continued down Crooked Spur, a sharp drop off to reach the valley and Bush Stream ensued. Quite spectacular views to be had.

After reaching the bottom of the spur, the trail took us through Bush Stream and back up the other side onto an overgrown track that had been washed out in places. Brooke had warned us about this as she'd missed the join to get onto it. It was indeed not at all obvious for those heading south, we had the advantage of coming the other way. We took a moment to look back up from the side of the valley over Bush Stream toward Crooked Spur.

After reaching the valley's bottom again, we'd be faced with a series of crossings through Bush Stream. Around a dozen total. The flow was quite significant, so each crossing required a good scoping for a safe crossing point. This, combined with the majority of the walk otherwise being on the river's bed made for slow progress out to the Rangitata.

However, we did eventually make it out to the gravel road-end at around 19:00, where we had a short 2 km south to get to Mesopotamia... our accomodation for the night. We arrived to find the proprietor, Sue, out doing jobs as we reached the driveway. She gave us a lift up to the house for the night. There, we were hoping to find two packages. One with Emma's new shoes, and one with mine and some food to get us through the next section. Only Emma's package had arrived. Disaster. We'll have to chase it up tomorrow.

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