Te Araroa (day 46) - St Arnaud to West Sabine Hut [Traverse Pass] / mile 1247

Big day with great views.

I have started extremely early to go over the Traverse Pass in the good weather, it was suppose to start raining later. As I walked into the communal kitchen and switched on the lights to make breakfast I've woken up an old gentleman sleeping on the sofa by the TV. He asked grumpily what time it was. "Ten past five" I answered, he seemed satisfied with that answer and went back to sleep. I think someone in his room must have been snoring so he decided to take the sofa instead.

I set off just after the sunrise. First section was going next to the Lake Rotoiti, sky was cloudy and obscured the view. After relatively easy and flat 15 miles, trail started to climb towards the pass, going next to John Tait and Upper Travers Huts. The second one was located just above the tree line with the majestic view of the mountains, many people were staying here for the night.

I kept on pushing, it was 3pm so I had lots of daylight left to finish where I planned. At the top of the pass I met a German Northbound hiker, she looked very tired and was using her hiking poles somewhat like crutches on her way down. The section she has just completed, and I was about to descend into was very steep and slow going. I took my time on the way down to save the knees from too much pressure, I needed them for the next month on the trail.

The views on the other side of the Traverse Pass were amazing. It reminded me of Sierra Nevada mountains. An impressive chain of massive, sturdy giants with snow patches still covering few of the peaks.

I begun the descent. Once below the tree line views have ended but the steepness continued for quite a while. At one point a toutouwai grey robin stopped me in tracks by one of the puddles and we had a 'conversation', he would pick up a leaf or a twig and I would tell him what it was. Robin came extremely close to me and I managed to snap few good pictures of him with my Nikon 1. I was very impressed with just how intelligent and curious those little bird are.

 I've reached West Sabine Hut at 7pm, cooked some Spam with cous cous and mash potato for dinner (yum!) and found a good bunk to spend the night on. There was a lot of people camping outside the hut by the river rather than sleeping inside. Reason being that huts in this areas required an additional 25$ booking on top of your regular Hut Pass. Luckily I got one unused ticket given by Floris yesterday.

I've also met Robert and Anna, a Slovakian couple I briefly saw yesterday in the Alpine Lodge. They told me that the weather report has changed and it shouldn't rain until midday tomorrow. That was a great news, as it would give me enough time to go over the next pass in a decent weather conditions. Next section involved some climbing down the steep rock and it wasn't recommended to do it during rain and wind. Anna was afraid of heights to start with so it looked like they will have to wait between the passes for a day until the weather clears completely.

My plan was to wake up early (again..) and hike an hour or two in darkness to get through the challenging section before the weather turned bad. If I succeeded the rest of the section looked quite easy and my next stop in Hamner Springs would be in three days.

With that in mind I set the alarm for 4am and went to bed.