Thursday 23.02.2023

• Te Araroa kilometres done: 2030.5km
• Official kms: 16km
• Garmin kms: 17.24km
• Total time: 8:19
• Calories burned: 3543
• Body battery: 7/10
• Accommodation: Tent at Waiau hut
• Tent nights tally: 15
• Zero days had so far: 20

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I awoke to see snow on the mountain tops when I looked out the hut window, that’s concerning as we are heading over Waiau pass this morning. This is about 700 metres higher than the hut & is very steep terrain.

Liz & Sam left before us. We left at 7am & started the climb up to Lake Constance. From here we climbed high above the lake itself to get around to the head of the lake it is impassable otherwise.

It was getting quite cold as we started climbing, it was at this point I wish I had gloves. By the time we got to the head of the lake & the short 500 metre walk up the valley we were at the bottom & start of the Waiau pass.

At this point Sam walked towards us, he had been feeling dizzy & as soon as he started climbing had to lie down so he decided to turn back & go back to Blue lake hut. I assume it may have been because it was so cold at 1 degree at this point with presumably a wind chill factor of -7 degrees.

We all took measures to warm up such as hats & hoods & I also put my spare socks on my hands as I was starting to lose feelings in my fingers.

We all started heading up the pass, slowly. It was a cold ascent but within 3.5 hours of leaving Blue lake hut we were at the top of the pass. We didn’t stay long up here as it was cold with snow that had settled last night.

We started making our way down the other side, I’m pretty sure this took longer than coming up! Stopping for lunch at the Waiau Forks campsite. This was most of today’s descent done!

After lunch there was a few kilometres of boulder fields to walk across before the valley started opening up, we also seen a couple of deer on the other side of the river at one point.

It wasn’t long before we reached Waiau hut, unfortunately the 6 bed hut already had 8 people staying in it, meaning our group of 4 as well as Liz & another person were resigned to tenting.

Oh well this is only night 15 in my tent & the 1st night on my new air mattress. Hope this one holds up!