34. Cascade Saddle

  • An image showing You always deal with surprises during hiking. Because you are isolated from  
modern life worries, because you keep walking in the wonders of a wild nature
or even bareness. Hiking is usually a great experience. “Walking is  
provoking. It’s going ahead things, harvesting freely along a fanciful furrow, living in a perpetually renewed wonder. Brisk walking!” Alexandre Poussin. Loyal to his call, we walk.
  • An image showing We reach the begining of the track by hichhiking. An old moustached  
Scottish man leads us to the entrance of the Rees Valley. There, we fully  
understand how lucky we are to be here. Mountains are so beautiful! We  
progress almost reverently in the marshes of the long valley. We feel  
tiny between these high mountains, capped with their pristine glaciers.
  • An image showing This hike is more difficult than the others we dealt with. You shouldn’t  
be afraid of wetting your feet. Actually, you don’t have the choice. Are you able to jump a three-meter-wide river with twenty kilos of equipments on your back? We aren’t. First, we hesitate. We remove the shoes and carefully hold it while crossing. But it’s written. We’ll  
once unintentionally put a brave step into the swamp. Then we let it  
go. We continue with the two feet happily swimming in the water. After  
all, if we should have wet feet, let's move fast! And the shoes keep the rhythm: Cop-plop.
  • An image showing After the meadow, we penetrate into the wood. We reach there the boundary of Mount Aspiring National Park. Immediately, we see the  
difference: the trail is fitted. We walk on swing bridges, gateways…  
It’s much more comfortable. And to balance the comfort, some showers take
us by surprise, as we are precisely leaving the forest. Hopefully, the hut  
is close.
  • An image showing We however arrive soaked. The rain didn’t miss us! We take refuge in  
the warm atmosphere of the Shelter Rock Hut. Our Scottish driver is already resting here. We vainly try to dry our clothes, but with this continuous rain, it’s  a waste of time.
  • An image showing The second day hiking we were gifted with a clear sky, a morning break. We can peacefully progress on the high valley, along the Forbes range. It is a  
black rocky, huge, steep and impassable chain: the famous Mordor.
  • An image showing To get through, we must reach the bottom and cross the Rees Saddle. The  
pass opens into a small valley sheltering a clogged river. Riding down south, we arrive in the Dart valley. The Dart Hut is at the crossing.
  • An image showing Obviously, once we arrive in the Dart Hut, we only think about eating (basic instinct) and resting. Then it starts to rain. We let ourselves be gently charmed by the comfort of this warm and dry shelter.
  • An image showing We are disoriented. The vegetation has disappeared. It is a mineral landscape, a desert plain marked by the passage of the glacier and the capricious river. The latter is dirty, blurred. It comes directly from  
the glacier, a few kilometres above. The virgin land where we progress  
is made of black sand and angular stones.  Yet this dark landscape is  
tinged with colours: shades of gray of rocks, turquoise of blue lakes,  
colours of lichens and mosses, yellow grasses that grow up there. We  
are floored by the fatigue of our body and the emerging shower. We  
find a good platform to camp, at a hundred meters from the glacier, at  
the foot of the pass.
  • The Kea Affair

    10

    An image showing Pierre is cooking the diner. We are caulked in the tent.
  • An image showing After this story, we remain awake. We must continue, even if the rain  
keeps falling continuously. We attack the pass, go up on the slippery  
slope. Keas are flying around, looking despicably after us.
  • An image showing Cascade Saddle has a particularity. From where we come, it remains  
accessible. However from the other side, it is a large cliff. The trail goes along it and leads to a high valley in which flows a broad river.
  • An image showing We take a break at the edge of the river. We are exhausted. We really would like to stand here longer, but it's too cold, too humid. This spectacular place remains inhospitable.
  • An image showing The trail doesn't go up the valley. We storm the other side, climbing the "Pylon". But it is to come down again better.
  • An image showing Thus ended the most beautiful, the most adventurous trek in New Zealand we have accomplished. A challenge I would advise all hikers, adventurers going to visit this beautiful country (check for good weather forecast before). The experience is well worth the discomfort and the efforts we invested!

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