- Time
- 3-4 days
- Grade
- Moderate/Difficult
- Access
- Drive up the Wairoa Gorge Rd to the forks. Turn left and park at the gate.
- Map
- BQ26, BR26, BR25
Tackling the seven summits on the Alpine Route in Nelson's beautiful, big backyard
We are geographically embarrassed. The luminous beams of our headlamps light up the swingbridge dangling across the river, but there is no sign or obvious track to the nearby hut. The descending darkness has reduced our vision to a pathetic circle of torchlight. What should have been a straightforward stroll to the hut has become an embarrassing epic – it’s easy to miss track markers and misread the map at night. It’s also painstakingly slow going over the rocky and rooty track sided by steep drop-offs. Malcolm and I had trudged up the track alongside the Wairoa River with twilight biting at our heels. Exhausted, we just want somewhere soft to lie down; a brief touch of comfort in a warm mug of tea. When we stumble into the ageing shanty at Mid-Wairoa at 9pm, dinner is long overdue and the air temperature is a tropical zero degrees. The following day starts with a deserved sleep-in. Long tramps often seem to start slowly, as the body gets accustomed to pack-carrying and the legs get used to the punishment. By the end of our tramp we will both be well-oiled tramping machines. We are in Mt Richmond Forest Park, on the long pathway that is the Te Araroa Trail and a spectacular 4–5 day circuit nicknamed the Alpine Route. Highly underrated, this loop is, perhaps, the best kept secret in the top of the South. Across the bridge, the well-marked trail climbs steeply up the valley wall for a couple of hours, finally emerging from the dark shadows onto an 800m knob. From here the barren Red Hill can be seen to the south-west – a distant massif of serpentine rock devoid of any vegetation. At a signed junction, an undulating sidle track leads off towards Tarn Hut – this diversion gives our screaming quad muscles some reprieve. A kereru darts and fantails flit. Malcolm spots a quartet of goats before we continue our intrepid journey upward. Through thinned, shaggy beech forest we amble, along a carpet of moss. Another DOC sign leads us off the main ridgeline to find the five-bunk Tarn Hut nestled in a large clearing. It’s a New Zealand Forest Service S-70 design and like all the nearly identical huts visited on this trip has its own quirks and idiosyncrasies. The adjacent lakelet is bathed in blazing sunshine, so we waste an afternoon there drinking tea and reading. All is quiet except the buzz of insects and the chortle of a lone tui. I chop firewood to stoke the Oregon potbelly while Malcolm chops salami for dinner. Later, the fire is lit to heat the hut and then we snuggle into our sleeping sacks. We anticipate a long struggle over four mountains so make an early start the next day. Bellbirds sing and the autumn sun attempts to warm us as we enjoy the pleasant ridge-top ramble. I am photographing the view towards Ben Nevis when a herd of wild goats suddenly bolts into the bush below. At the turn-off to the Lee Valley, I dump my pack and make a lightning ascent of Bishops Cap, a perfect pyramid of rock that stabs into the sky at 1425m. Meanwhile, Malcolm has passed me and it’s not until the cairn at Purple Top (1532m) that I finally catch up. From here, colossal views of the west face of Rintoul, with its diminutive dollhouse visible in an obvious clearing below, unfold. Looks are deceiving and it takes a full hour to reach the tiny Mt Rintoul Hut; a real gem of a place with a tangible sense of exposure. Alas, time is ticking on, so we scramble up scree slopes onto the shattered tops of Mt Rintoul (1731m). Our jubilation is momentarily interrupted when the route is blocked by an improbable rocky gendarme. This obstacle is negotiated with a short sidle beneath it to regain the ridgeline; then Rintoul is ours, a mere stroll along the slanted plateau. [caption id="attachment_5550" align="aligncenter" width="1200"]
