Te Araroa Day 80, Locke Stream Hut to Kiwi Hut

Starting km: 2162
Finishing km: 2170
km covered today: 8

After the previous day's non-stop rain and raging rivers the start of the day was a relief. The rain had stopped overnight and looked to be staying away.

The six of us staying at Locke Stream Hut all departed at the same time, planning to do the two major river crossings together if necessary.

As it turned out the first one was no problem. We could cross the Taramakau solo with no trouble. The previous day I wouldn't have gone near the river, even with a big group. So this was a good sign.

The walking after this was a breeze, and it took us barely two hours to pass by the Kiwi Hut and reach the second crossing of the Taramakau.

The trail notes suggested crossing it first, then the Otehake River above their confluence.  Fellow Canadian Sage (who leads bear tours in BC) linked up to cross and had no trouble.  The first braid of the Otehake was manageable, but with Sage, Taito and I we managed okay. Curly, my previous day's walking mate managed it on his own, though had us all feeling a bit worried for him when he lost his footing once in the process.

The final braid of the Otehake was another story. It was wide and moving very fast and, though you couldn't see the bottom it looked pretty deep.  We decided to wait for our other two hutmates.

Once they arrived we made a plan.  There was a spot just above the confluence that looked as wide and slow as any on the braid (which wasn't saying much) and had good exit points downstream of us on both sides of the river.  We joined up in a line, me picked as the group leader and at the upstream end of the chain, as I was one of the strobgest members of the group and my (still limited) river crossing experience was the most in the group. This meant that I'd be taking the worst of the current and would make the decision of if/when we'd bail on the crossing and return to shore.

The first few shuffling steps were manageable, but the current was strong. And by strong, I mean causing my trekking pole to vibrate in my hand and threatening to pull my feet downriver if I lifted them too far off the ground.  A few more steps and the water was midway between my stomach and chest. The current was now wanting to slide my feet on the bottom even when they were firmly planted. "Nope," I said to the group, "we can't do this, go back." We shuffled slightly back and let the current help us down to the bar downstream extending out from the side we'd started from.

We'd made it 30, maybe 40% of the way across. We searched up and down the Otehake for better crossing spots. They were all either faster or had exit points that were small bluffs or cliffs.

Down past the confluence everything looked at least as fast and deep as that final braid.  We wouldn't be making any further crossing attempts any time soon

We all sat on the bank enjoying an hour or so of sun. Sage and I decided to head back to the Kiwi Hut for the night. I thought everyone was planning to do the same, but I later learned that Taito decided to wait and see if the river went down far enough fast enough to cross, and otherwise to camp nearby. Rain and Rochelle decided to head up the Otehake, looking for a safe crossing point and planning to bush bash back. Curly continued to think about crossing and even voiced plans to swim(!) These ideas ranged (at least in my mind) from somewhat sensible to outright foolish, but no one would be deterred.

On my way back to Kiwi Hut I met a group that had already been there for three and four nights. With two of us, three of them and six more that showed up afterwards the six bunk hut was more than a little full.

But we'd collected lots of firewood. There was plenty of room on the hut floor. A billy to boil water in above the fire. And even a couple of ukeleles in peoples packs that got used for a brief (fun, but probably an okay thing) singalong (bye bye Miss American pie, I drove my Chevy to the levy but the levy was dry...)

It was an all around fun social occasion.

Curly, Rain, Rochelle and Taito never showed up at the hut. I really hope they made smart choices, or got away with them unscathed if they didn't. As you can tell from the description above, big, fast flowing rivers are not things to trifle with and there's good reason for all the warnings about them.

After all having made a cautious decision we can (and will) go back and try tomorrow.