Days 109-114: Harper Pass and Mingha-Deception

Whew. We had an exhausting five days through the Harper Pass and Mingha-Deception tracks. Harper Pass was not our favorite section - partly due to the pace we were on, partly due to the weather, and partly due to the lack of the mind-numbingly amazing views we've come to expect after the last couple of weeks. The Mingha-Deception was tough, but interesting... I'll cover that later though.

In the latest instance of our incredible timing on this trip, we were scheduled to be on the Mingha-Deception at the same time as about 500 trail runners competing in a coast to coast, cycle-run-kayak endurance race. We realized this in Hanmer Springs, and figured we could either cool our heels for almost 3 days, or speed up by a day. We decided to try to squeak through before the race. Spoiler alert: we made it! But we probably would have been happier with the slower plan.

We got off to a bad start from Hanmer Springs. It took us several hours to catch rides all the way back to the trail. At one point, after we had been waiting for almost 3 hours, Jason showed up at the road, and caught a ride in 2 minutes. It wasn't his fault - he tried to give it to us, but the car only had room for one. Luckily we caught a ride a few minutes later with a nice, but quite deaf, Englishman. We didn't get moving on the trail until almost noon though, which is not a good way to go faster than normal.

The beginning of the track was fairly easy, and along the way we were treated to nice views of the Hope River valley.

Hope River valley - these braided rivers look so cool

The trail isn't always hard or death defying

HUGE dragonflies. Nothing for scale in this picture, but the
wingspan was easily wider than my hand

We had planned to push through to Hurunui Hut, but, because of our late start, didn't have enough daylight to make it. We made the unpleasant decision to (gasp) camp halfway to it, rather than stopping early at the Hope-Kiwi Hut. It was tough to leave the Hope-Kiwi, which was a really nice hut, but we knew we had no chance of sticking to the schedule if we didn't walk for another couple of hours.

We found a nice campsite next to Three Mile Creek, about halfway between Hope-Kiwi and Hurunui. Well, it was nice for the first 2 minutes. Then the sandflies showed up. All of them. For the first time, we both broke out our headnets and gloves for protection.

Dinner was cooked and eaten as fast as possible, teeth were brushed, and we got into the tent for the final reckoning before bedtime. It was a gruesome battle, and we barely emerged as victors, leaving literally hundreds of dead sandflies lying on the floor of the tent. In retrospect, if we had walked for the amount of time we had spent killing sandflies, we probably would have made it to the next hut.

Sandflies like Liz's butt. And legs.
I didn't tell her I took this picture until days later, when
the mental scarring had subsided

The next morning was equally unpleasant, and we packed up and got moving as fast as possible. At first, it was more easy walking, but eventually the trail started to disappear. This section was a mix of walking in the forest next to the river, and walking on the rocks in the riverbed. In some places the trail was just washed out, and I'm sure in other places we missed transitions from river bed to forest... either way, we spent way too long bushwhacking, and eventually gave up on the trail completely and just walked in the riverbed.

We had been planning to make it over Harper Pass that day, to stay in the Locke Stream Hut. Unfortunately, the going was pretty slow, and we didn't reach Harper Pass Bivvy (the last shelter before the pass) until almost 6pm. With some dark clouds rolling in, and another 3 hours of walking, including a steep descent, to reach Locke Stream, we decided to call it a day and stay at the bivvy. It was small, dark, and cramped, but still much nicer than we expected. In retrospect, we started way too late (8:30 am!) for such a long day. Why we didn't think to set the alarm earlier is something we still haven't figured out.

We woke up the next day (my birthday), in a cloud. Everything was wet and grey. The climb to the pass was short, and the descent was a bit slow and slippery, but not too bad. Along the way we encountered more washed out or non-existent trail.

Harper's Pass. Not the most exciting picture, but we
only have a few from the day because of the rain.

Luckily, we ran into some DOC workers cutting a new trail! They pointed us in the right direction, and from there to Locke Stream Hut it was smooth sailing. It was bittersweet though - we realized they had stayed at the hut the night before. DOC workers get helicoptered in for trail maintenance, and always have tons of fresh food, as well as beer, and are usually generous with them both. Finding yourself staying in a hut with them is kind of like winning the lottery. And we missed it! Oh well.

The rest of the day... well, let's just say it was a low point of the South Island so far. A combination of wet weather, wet feet, really crappy trail conditions (walking over boulders in the river bed for kilometers upon kilometers), and knowing we had a long way to go to get out to the road really had us down. We decided to skip the last bit of the day (the Flood Track, described as having "several sharp ascents and descents while sidling on a steep hill"), and forded the Otira River to cut out to the highway a bit early. We were worried the river would be unfordable, but luckily the rain was annoying but not heavy, and it was a piece of cake.

We ended our crappy day on an up note though! We got lucky and quickly caught a ride to Arthur's Pass, checked in to our hostel, and then met up with the Brits! Michelle was working at a cafe there, and James was resting there after hurting his leg in the Richmond Ranges. James was hoping to get back on the trail in a few days, and Michelle was planning on joining back up with him at Lake Tekapo. We spent a couple of hours hanging out and catching up with them. It was great to see them again after so long... we miss our north island trail friends!

Day 113 was a tough one. We got lucky again, and caught a ride back to the trail without much trouble. From there, we started up the Deception River valley on the Mingha-Deception track. Along the way, we ran into several runners scouting the trail before tomorrow's race. One of them told us that, if we followed the trail the whole way, we would ford the river 21 times.

The Morrison Footbridge, start of the (cue dramatic music) Mingha-Deception track

We definitely were not able to follow the trail the whole way - it was more riverbed walking, and we missed several crossings and forest tracks along the way. Unlike a normal forest track, there was no risk of getting lost - you follow the river. However, if you're on the wrong side of the river, or miss a cut track, you can waste tons of time climbing over boulders in the riverbed. So, we ended up wasting tons of time in a few spots, and it was slow going again. As if it weren't hard enough to begin with, it started to rain, which made everything slippery.

Along the way, we passed a few race officials, and bags of gear that had been dropped by helicopters. Apparently they set up stations along the way to monitor the runners, and provide aid if needed.

Eventually, we reached Goat Pass Hut. The last 2 kilometers were the hardest. The riverbed and valley narrow near the top, so we ended up basically climbing up the river for the last hour or so. We were incredibly happy to see the hut, which was filled with about a dozen or so officials and first aid providers. There was plenty of room for us though, and we were able to use their gas cooker, and even a bit of fresh milk! We had a nice evening hearing all about the race and its history (apparently, one year, it rained enough that many runners were trapped on the mountain by rising rivers, and they had to be airlifted out).

Day 114 was a relief. We were exhausted from 4 really, really long days in a row, and were happy to find the route down from Goat Pass Hut to be much easier than the way up. We left early, to try to be off the trail before the first runners came through. We barely made it - we reached the road just as the first one came out. We felt a little strange walking out of the river valley to a small crowd of spectators, but no one seemed to mind that we were there.

Due to rain, rocks, and rivers, I only have 2 pictures of the
Mingha-Deception - the very beginning and very end

One of the first crazy people... I mean runners... to come through

We continued on a little further to the finish line (we avoided walking through it), and found the holy grail of thru hiking: free beer. The coast to coast race is sponsored by Speight's, and they had a truck pouring free beer for anyone who wanted it. We hung out near the finish line for a bit - met a few people who were cheering for family members, downed a few cold ones, and ate a few meat pies. The beer definitely erased some of the bumps and bruises we suffered in rushing to get here.

Overall, the Mingha-Deception was tough, but I found it to be a really cool track. I can't say I entirely enjoyed it, but that was mostly due to the rain making all of the rock scrambling slippery and precarious. If the weather had been good, it would have been a challenging, but awesome route.

Free as in beer

After we had our fill of beer, we continued on for another few hours to Bealey Hut, the first hut in the next section. 

Waimakariri River valley

Still some snow in the mountains!

We are both totally exhausted, but it was pretty cool to be in and around the race.  Who knows, we may even be in the official race footage! Also, we know there are people who keep up paces like this (or faster) for their entire trips... we're not sure how they do it. Maybe longer legs help?