Day 38: Rangitata crossing to Manuka hut

After waiting around all of yesterday for my shoes, and our food to arrive at 18:30, we were only able to walk a short distance up to the river's edge before daylight faded. So today we started at a river-side campsite to begin our Rangitata crossing. It's 9–10 km in all to get from the end of the TA trail on the south, to the beginning of the TA trail on the north. The conventional advice for a safe/successful crossing of the Rangitata is to head upstream slightly of the Pott's river confluence with the Rangitata. We followed this advice.

We were able to check the riverflow last night, and it clocked in at a little over 70 m^3/s. Though its current state would have to remain unknown, we had no rain fall last night and there is probably still some snow around in the head waters, so it should be slightly slower. Unfortunately, the phones were put away in our waterproof electronics bags, in case we took a slip—so we did not get the best photos of the crossing. There were only two braids with significant flow and depth. The first, and the last, out of about 10 or so braids. We took our time identifying the safest options for crossing these, but it was not too much to baulk at. We were successfully back on the trail on the north side an hour and a half later.

During the crossing it was encouraging to see so many Dotterel out there. At the same time though, there was much evidence of 4WD's toting around out there–somewhat disheartening. Perhaps they're sensible enough to stay away during breeding season (July to December), and maybe all these tracks are either brand new or months old... hard to say.

Reaching the trail, we quickly found that we would have a very flat, very open, and very long way to go in order to reach our hut for the night. There was only one small ~200 m hill to walk up in the middle, to reach something of a saddle. Here we found our first significant switchbacks of the whole trail... far from required here, and indeed the straight up and down track looked far more worn. Perhaps DOC might consider rehiring Ang to relocate these switchbacks to the Motatapu track? At the saddle we could look back down toward Lake Clearwater, and out back toward the Rangitata now a long way in the distance.

A long time later, we got to the junction with the Stour track which leads down a valley with Mt Somers at its end. Unfortunately, the weather rolled in just as we were getting there. But down the valley, some 5 or 6 km away is Mt Somers, on the Woolshed creek hut side. We stopped to take a photo of it for Emma's sister Rachel, as she had been enquiring. But the mountain itself is well drowned out by the cloud. Imagination will need to suffice.

Then we peaked over a small rise, passed Lake Emily to look down into a valley.

A short few km's through the valley and we'd be where we needed to get to for the day.

Finally, 41 km done for the day, just shy of a marathon, we found Manuka hut hidden around the backside of a spur.

It was quite a late arrival, and there was one girl already there for the night. We apologised to her for this, and set about making dinner. Our first dehydrate for the Te Araroa, as that was what we could order to come with my shoes. I had not missed it. I'm not looking forward to our drop boxes which are packed with the stuff.

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