2013 Queen's Birthday Ride - Canterbury

[hilslamer]

...feel human enough to get this typed up. Damn but whatever bug I caught over ~Sunday night has had me down for the count, glad we got out of there when we did or I would have really paid the price.

CHAPTER 1

I was a last-minute addition to the whole ride, based on SE950's invite and a round of left-leg sciatica that was slowly subsiding. In any case, with a lot of NSAIDs it cleared up about a day before, so I set about prepping and packing Friday(my 34th birthday, ironically - though I'm not a queen in any sense of the word...) night for an early morning departure:



...and redezvous with the rest of the group in Springfield for fuel and final preparations:



We had killer light underneath the clouds andon the mountains from the sunrise on the way up into Arthur's Pass:



Headed off the tarmac over towards Lake Coleridge:



....for a rendesvoux with Alfie at the turnoff for Mt Olympus:



Our fearless leader/ride organizer, ADVGD:



From there, we headed into Glenthorne Station where we payed the farmer a small fee for access. The road was a shingle-studded hoot, and I'm sure we all found ourselves sideways at least once whether we meant to or not:



ADVGD chats with one of the landowners:



...before heading into the fray of the Wilberforce river valley(note rainclouds gathering):



Rain = rainbows, with the last of the sunlight we would see for the morning...looking due South down the Wilberforce:



After wandering around the Wilberforce riverbed and a tributary of it:



...we finally found a hut that ADVGD was looking for although the rain was getting incrementally more intense:





...it was occupied by hunters, though, so we warmed up a but and ate a spot of food and headed back towards the intended route:





Enroute, ADVGD noticed via the voltmeter on his bike that the charging voltage seemed to be dropping fast - an abnormal behaviour. After some discussion, it was decided to head out to Windwhistle where Alfie had left his ute, so that ADVGD could run back to Chch to see about a replacement stator. As such, he gave us some general directions and plans and said that he'd be up to meet us at one of the huts up the Havelock river, with a route in via Erewhon Station:



A little short on fuel and playing it safe to kill time to see if he could catch up to us that day, we headed to Methven for fuel and "real" food:

It should be noted that there was much discussion about making a big, fun, afternoon-only loop back to Methven, to wait there at a warm pub/hotel rooms and see if ADVGD could catch up to ride with us the following two days. Hindsight being 20/20, with the weather forecast being what it was we would have been much smarter to do it this way. But, with out minds set on continuing the ride, we forged onward for Erewhon Station to pay the fee and head across the Clyde river and up the Havelock river valley.


Since the ride back into the hills had some dull moments, Alfie had to keep entertained:



Note more weather above the highest peaks:



On arrival at Erewhon Station:





...we chatted with the farmer about water levels, etc. I will never forget his advice to us: "...if the water looks or turns milky, turn around and get out of there." And in the same statement, he made some comment about "noise-polluting contraptions" as he lit off his tractor, which he had to shut off to talk to us...LOL...:



So, with full permission to cross his land and get ourselves into our own trouble, we headed towards the Clyde river to find a way across:





Which there was, but not by a whole lot:



Matt coaxes his XR through a deeper spot to get over the shelf of the near bank, while SE950 et al survey possibly easier routes across:



This was the deepest/main channel of the Clyde as we headed East across it to the Havelock, and while the photo makes it a little hard to tell, the water itself was pretty clear by my standards. Being a visitor to NZ, I sort of tried to read the Kiwi's take on the water, but none of them seemed to hesitate much so I figured I wasn't too far off the scale in my judgement. Looking at it all later, I realized that the Clyde would have gone milky a good while after the Havelock...especially with the approaching Norwester weather. Yet another lesson from this trip!

Looking up the Havelock, with weather clearly getting angrier(no rain, though, and dry riverbed still):



Looking back from that spot, East-ish toward Erewhon as a couple of our group traverse the riverbottom:



Further up the Havelock, looking back towards the Clyde river valley/Havelock confluence:



Looking back down the Havelock itself now; you can see someon's headlight in there for scale:



Looking across the river basin, Alfie has taken a tumble and is getting up:



By this point, there are ~4 of us out ahead of the other two, and we can't find where we expect the huts to be. We later found out we were farther up than we needed to be to get to the Growler hut. One hut(that we later found out has been destroyed by an avalanche) looked like it was up a tributary - so I rode up several only to find we were at least one tributary away. Looking up the tributary:



Eventually, we the four of us that made it up this far regroup and make it up to what we now know was, ironically, called Mistake Flats hut. We find it full of 4 hunters and pretty cozy anyway...and since we are still expecting two more riders, we obviously are too many for this hut. The hunters are unsure if anyone else it at the Curtis hut, so we decide to investigate across the Havelock River, due ~East from Mistake Flats:



Knowing that we will now be crossing multiple channels of the Havelock, I set off to find the shallowest way through ahead of the group...only to notice that the water has suddenly turned very milky, and it is hard to see the bottom in many places now.

[Transalper]

...
By this point, there are ~4 of us out ahead of the other two, and we can't find where we expect the huts to be. We later found out we were farther up than we needed to be to get to the Growler hut. ..

Eventually, we the four of us that made it up this far regroup and make it up to what we now know was, ironically, called Mistake Flats hut. We find it full of 4 hunters and pretty cozy anyway...and since we are still expecting two more riders, we obviously are too many for this hut. ...

Ironic you didn't go back to find and check on the missing two riders since we were now back there settled in safe and warm having tea at the Growler.

[hilslamer]

Ironic you didn't go back to find and check on the missing two riders since we were now back there settled in safe and warm having tea at the Growler.

I suggested that we regroup entirely at the Mistake Flats hut(as in, wait for you two to show up there before proceeding anywhere) a couple of times. At the time, we had apparently misunderstood the hunters in the Mistake Flats hut and it was my understanding that they thought that the Growler Hut was the one that had been destroyed by the avalanche. As we found out from Reuben at the Curtis hut, it was intact and by then it was way too late and dark to try and double back to check and see...we collectively assumed that you both had made the Growler hut and hoped for the best.

It was a great relief to see your bikes there when we found you there a day later.

[Transalper]

Spent some time wondering if we should leave most our gear at the Growler and go up unloaded to the next hut to see if you lot were there too, but decided it was safer to stay put, didn't really want to go any further up the valley at that time and then there was all that added wind the next day.
Was pretty sure you could hardly miss seeing the hut when coming back out but wasn't sure when that would be.
Bit of a relief to see ya arrive too.

[kwazulu natal]

twas an adventure ride alright.Wasn 't planning on the free ride down the river when Matt and I tried to cross on foot.Had a blast and hooked up with some wacky kiwi blokes and one crazzy american, till the next adv.

[hilslamer]

Chapter 2

In the process of finding the Mistake Flats hut, I realized that at the proper zoom level on my GPS, I could see the hut as a placemark. Well, duh...If I had known this all along, I would have been using the placemark for the Growler hut as a navigational destination. However, at this point, with rain falling and daylight waning fast(especially in the valley we were in) we had to make some decisions. With the Curtis hut seeming much closer and now with a placemark to navigate to, I headed off ahead of the group again to see about getting there. My intent was to backtrack to them when I found ways across...which I did, although when I got there I found that a young couple were staying there:



His name was Reuben, and he was another Tar hunter that was waiting for the weather to clear to get some hunting in with his girlfriend Hana(sp? can't remember exactly...) and their dog, Bess. They had a Can-Am Outlander - a huge 4x4 quad with all the bells and whistles - along with a Nissan Safari that was set up real nice for fording. Surprised to see me pull up, he greeted me and I explained that there were several more on the way...and then found out there were only four bunks in this hut, but that it was a lot roomier inside. I asked if they were OK with us staying the night, and appologized for crashing their party...

I rode back down to run back across to the others to find that the river had risen a lot in just the last 30 minutes even, enough that I doubted getting back across the Northernmost channel. The water was now complete milk. I could see that they were working their way across, and we had maybe 30 minutes of daylight left...so I rode back up to the hut, and put my bike where I knew they would see the headlight, and started signalling. On, off, on, off...nothing back but occasional random winks of headlights sweeping through tight turns. When those stopped, it was getting so dark I could barely see even the Mistake Flats hut at all. Thanks, mom, for your terrible night vision...

By the time Reuben and I rode his quad back down there to look around, it was getting really dark. He said he could see people walking, but I couldn't see much of anything at all except the grey riverbottom and the skyline of peaks around us. After it got darker, he broke out an awesome LED spotlight and only then could I *barely* see the other three of my group approaching us on foot:




They had elected to leave their bikes out there, in light of the wind that was now howling steadily down the riverbottom. Matt and Rusty had tried to ride back to Mistake Flats, but Matt's bike drowned and at that point they were closer to Alfie and Curtis hut than Mistake flats. Alfie had drowned his bike between the two biggest channels, and so elected to leave it there and collectively they decided to head to Curtis hut on foot. As they approached with luggage in hand, it was obvious that they had locked arms and waded through all of the channels. Rusty, however, was soaked to the core - he had slipped and lost hold of the others and swam ~100(?) meters downstream in his riding gear! He managed to hold on to his Giant Loop bag, although it had been completely submerged as well. Reuben gave them all a ride back up to the Curtis Hut, while I rode my bike back up behind them.

Rusty was partially hypothermic from his unintended swim - but worse yet almost all of his riding gear, boots and also "dry" clothes and sleeping bag were totally saturated. Since Reuben and Hana already had the hut wicked warm, it was more than a welcome abode for the night. We learned that we had missed the Growler entirely because we followed the riverbottom and not the 4x4 track on the alluvial fans above it, and that it also had an airstrip nearby that was only obvious looking back down the riverbottom on it. Hot food was the first order of business:




We concluded that the others must have found the Growler hut, and shacked up there. It was the only reason they would not have caught up to us by now, or at least ended up at the Mistake Flats hut - and we would have seen headlights somewhere throughout our debacle crossing the Havelock...but there was no way to confirm this. And, the weather was getting worse - the Curtis hut is way up on a hillside, and the cables lashed to each corner of the hut should have given some indication of the wind we would have all night long up there. We made dinners and laughed about the situation...Matt's WheatBix was now simply powdered wheat:


...and Bess was really well behaved, given the tight quarters and people eating food all around her:


Situations like this always have a silver lining in some way. Alfie told us the story of his near-death electrical accident, Rusty wowed us with stories of South Africa, and we generally all got on very well despite each having about 1 cubic meter apiece to inhabit inside the hut. I felt bad that we had taken Reuben and Hana's hut that they had all to themselves prior to our arrival, but it was too late to do anything any different by the time night fell.

I don't know about everyone else, but I didn't sleep much that night. It rained all night long, at one point sleeted pretty good too, and the wind on the hut shook and shuddered it all night long. At times, gusts shook it hard enough that I could see the stuff we had hanging in the rafters swaying afterwards. It was a good place to be, honestly, out of the weather and with a hot woodstove - so sleep was really secondary.

***********

As the light flooded the valley between us and the Mistake Flats hut, we could see the bikes left out in the riverbottom - none were left standing. The good news was that they hadn't been washed away and tumbled down the riverbottom by floodwaters into balls of twisted metal. Based on the rainfall, that was my fear. Reuben had a spotting scope that we used to assess the situation from the Curtis hut before venturing out further that morning:



Looking across at Mistake Flats hut, you can see small black blurs that are downed bikes laying in the foreground:


The clouds had cleared a lot above us and downstream:


...so at about ~10am I put boots, helmet and gloves on and rode down to the riverbottom to look at actual water levels. What I was not ready for down there, was the wind: it was so windy that the wind was picking up water from the river and dousing it across the rocks everywhere. Stopped with it to my back, I almost got blown off the bike several times. I would estimate it at ~30kph steady, with up to ~60kph gusts at irregular intervals. It was so windy that I could not ride across the riverbottom - only up and down it, with the wind to my back or in my face. If I tried to cross it, the wind would either knock me over or blow me so far downstream on the slippery wet rocks that I could not actually progress back up the river. It was like the opposite of tacking a sailboat into the wind, and combined with the rocks there, incredibly tricky. I managed to get the camera lense clean of water mist momentarily and get a shot up and down the river bottom:

Looking downstream at a "minor" channel:


Looking upstream at a now "major" channel:


I rode down the river down to where the access 4x4 road for the Curtis hut meets the rest of the riverbottom, and deduced that getting back across there was not at all an option. The meant we needed to get back to the Southwest side of the Havelock and to follow that side back to the Growler to see if the others were there. Riding back to the spot, appeared as though the wide crossing that I had ridden across the main channel when the water was lower the evening before was probably the safest place to cross back again.

I returned with the news, and we decided to wait it out until 2pm and make a decision from there. The drowned bikes were unknowns, as was getting to them, as was getting my bike back across. By 2pm however, waether was getting worse again and rain was falling some more. In the end, Reuben gave those on foot a ride down to a shallower, wider spot I had crossed the evening before - which was now well over knee-high and with swift current:




They eventually ended up locking arms and wading across(sorry for blurriness; camera lense into the rain/wind):



...with me attempting an against-current upstream path that ended in a stalled bike right in the middle of the flow. Big mistake. Reuben rode his quad in to try to rescue or assist, but despite being heavy and 4wd it was too buoyant and he couldn't maintain a position where I was. I started working my bike backwards with the current and towards the opposite shore while trying to hold the bike upright, eventually Alfie and Rusty waded out to me, arms locked, to help pull me to shore. I don't know where I would have gone without them at that point, but in any case I thanked them and was very glad to be across the deepest channel. I suppose I might have made it to the shelf of a shore, but getting a dead bike over it would have been a chore by myself.

After checking the airbox for water, draining, and some cranking and clearing, my bike refired. Thankfully. Miraculously, none of the bikes that had fallen over had either dripped all of their fuel out OR been too drowned that we couldn't get them refired as well. It meant that we had _well_ over an extra hour more that afternoon than I had planned to make it back to the Growler hut, and still a surplus of fuel. *Whew* Gettign to the other bikes and getting them started:





After several more crossings on running bikes, we worked our way back over to the Mistake Flats side:



...and found the CORRECT 4x4 track that took us to the Growler hut. Riding back down this and downstream, you can clearly see the airstrip cleared off the slope adjacent to the hut(to the right of the airstrip in this photo) itself:


...if only we had known about the airstrip and looked back at the right time...

Arriving at the Growler hut, I saw Transalper's bike and then SE950's bike and was really glad to see them come out of the hut looking warm and dry. Four other Tar hunters were there, with much more stock-looking Nissan Safari's. Reuben and Hana had already loaded up and headed that way via the opposite riverbank and arrived ahead of us with the news we were on the way. If I could choose the scenery in a place to be stranded, this would be at the top of the list:



An obvious headcount revealed that although this hut had 6 bunks, we had ten people if Reuben and Hana decided to join us. Luck for us, it was by far the biggest hut in the valley, so floorspace meant four more wasn't too tight of a fit while we all waited for the floodwaters to recede. After taking a partial swim myself, and forging through the rain and wind most of the daylight hours, I was definitely ready for a warm stove and a meal. Meals were running a little low, though, and this would prove to be one of the more motivating factors for eventually leaving to find a way out despite the odds two days later.

[Night Falcon]

Epic !!

[Woodman]

Thanks for sharing, and very well written.

[pete-blen]

yer going to have to hang up yer boots after this one...
all other rides are going to seem a bit boreing...

[Transalper]

So very glad I followed Ian to the Growler and missed that chapter 2.
Once back home I mentioned to ADVGD that putting the Huts in as separate waypoints would help them stick out on the GPS screen a lot more, that would work for me especially at the more distant zoom levels as my user waypoints are set to display big in size and on far out zoom levels.

[ADVGD]

...

CHAPTER 1

Great pics and writeup Tim

Once back home I mentioned to ADVGD that putting the Huts in as separate waypoints would help them stick out on the GPS screen a lot more, that would work for me especially at the more distant zoom levels as my user waypoints are set to display big in size and on far out zoom levels.

I'm surprised to see you post this comment Carl. Don't lose sight of the fact I locked in your Queens Birthday ride only to find out a month out from turning the key you dumped the entire route organisation onto me at one of the busiest and most hectic periods of my business. In spite of this I spent countless hours (many nights working past midnight) pinning down landholders and putting together that route. As mentioned on post #1 of this thread, this was a ride to inspect track connecting sections, the GPS files were never going to be exhaustive. In spite of that, even with my absence they were still adequate when accompanied with the ride overview document and route rundown on my departure for you all to continue on.

If you load decent GPS mapping software on your GPS and you'll have every hut in NZ at your fingertips.

[XF650]

Next time I jet boat the Havelock I must remember to follow you guys - it's normally a challenge to get up there.

[Transalper]

I'm surprised to see you post this comment Carl. Don't lose sight of the fact I locked in your Queens Birthday ride only to find out a month out from turning the key you dumped the entire route organisation onto me....

If you load decent GPS mapping software on your GPS and you'll have every hut in NZ at your fingertips.

Hey, looks like you took my last post as a dig at you or something similar, I'm sorry if you took it that way, I wasn't trying to blame you for anything. All I had on the table was a basic trip to Alexandra and a repeat of old ground. Don't think you would have got anything useful from trying to tie in with that.
I just felt that waypointing huts was a good suggestion for the future and for anyone else thinking of doing such a ride, I already have a lot of DOC camp sites downloaded in bulk and campable rest areas where I usually ride permanently on my GPS as user waypoints for the same reason as to make them easy to see from a distance.
When I zoom up a heap it appears the software I'm already using does have some of the huts included but they just don't stand out at the zoom levels I was looking at. Probably could stop and try using the find feature but I find that's awkward.

I thank you here and now for the ride and the effort it took in case it wasn't clear before.
As I think the others have indicated for themselves, I too would be a starter again in an instant.
Thanks.

[JATZ]

Epic !!

I think that sums it up nicely

[hilslamer]

Chapter 3

We were all cold, tired and hungry so I don't have a lot of pictures from the next ~12 hours(Sunday evening - Monday morning). For me, I was also getting further into fighting whatever virus I had, and my throat was getting really sore, so my goal was to warm up and dry out as fast as possible above all else. What I can say is that we were all realizing that we were going to be there at least an extra day and night based on the water levels and dropping temperature. Reuben and his girlfriend unloaded the quad and went out spotlighting after dark, while the rest of us had dinner and then sat up talking about anything interesting. Due to early darkness, bedtime seemed late but was probably like 8:00pm...LOL They got back late and posted up on the floor, leaving the dog to sleep in the ute cab. It rained steadily all night long, so much so that the entire 4x4 track in front of the hut was essentially a creek in the morning when we awoke.

I guess it should be stated here that there was some confusion as to our options of a way out that involved the least number of water crossings. We had come in via the riverbottom, but the hunters in the Growler hut rumored that there might be a way out via the Rangitata...the Rangitata starts where the Havelock and Clyde confluence, so technically we were already on the correct side of the Havelock to be on the correct(read: true right) side of the Rangitata. This fact would come to bear later on, but in the end we all got out on the same track - but not the way we all came in(supposedly...). What mislead us the most was that the track along the West bank of the Rangitata they mentioned knowing about and that we all ended up taking out, was not on any of our maps or in any of the GPS's we had along...I'm sure of this because we had plenty of time to study them all closely(and at all zoom levels...).

My suspicions about their lack of understanding of our situation were further confirmed when we(the motorbikers) started discussing food supplies and rationing plans: one of the hunters promptly proceeded to move all of their food out to their vehicles. They were cordial, and even friendly the first night we were there, but even amongst themselves didn't talk much and mostly sat in their bunks and read magazines or books.

Monday morning, two of the hunters drove down to the river due East from the hut, and came back shaking heads and declaring that they were "gonna be there a while." The rest of us read books and waited things out. Reuben left his quad unloaded, in the interest of letting the ute sit higher and keeping it less tipsy for water crossings, and after a quick breakfast left us the remainder of their bag of pre-cooked sausages and declared that they were going to make a stab at departing. In light of this, we all filled out a piece of paper with names, and contact addresses/emails/phone numbers to let wives/girlfriends/work contacts know we were stranded but OK and that we didn't know when we would be out exactly:



Over the next couple of hours of the morning, we found that Reuben's backcountry intuition had worked well for him; the temperature dropped swiftly and dramatically from ~10 deg C to -2 deg C, rain began falling heavily again, and eventually it began to snow:



...and stick:



...and snow harder:



...and stick together/on the ground:



Later that afternoon, the hunters from the Mistake Flats hut came by:



...and were willing to try to find a way out as well. Only one of their vehicles had a snorkel of significance, and certainly neither were anywhere near as serious as Reuben's rig in terms of clearance or tires. Again, no mention from them of the Rangitata route out - and as we found later, their tracks following/over Reuben's at the crossing of the Clyde revealed that they had faught their way across all of the water channels. It continued to snow:



...and snow:



...and snow:



Restless, I sacrificed dry feet to step out of the hut for a shot up the Havelock gorge:



That evening, we boiled the sausages on the woodstove for dinner...after fasting most of the day(except a couple of lollies and some pumpkin seeds my girlfriend made), a cheap nasty sausage tasted pretty damn good:



The others stayed as occupied as they could with a deck of cards someone had left in the hut:



I layed down and tried as best as I could to sleep and rest, although with this many characters being this bored together in one place it was hard not to join in to the laughter if not he conversation. I was afraid to talk too much, as my throat was getting worse...it wasn't until late that evening that I realized that the snow was a blessing in disguise: I started scooping it up with my camp cup and using it to sooth my sore throat. I've never eaten so much snow in my life!


In an act that surprised me/us even further, the hunters hauled a bunch of delicious-looking food inside again and began to cook it up in grand fashion. Steak, potatos, peas, the works...and not one offer of any of it to any of us, in any form at all. Not even leftovers or drippings. In fact, they all ate it with headlamps on:



...even though there was plenty of light in the hut to eat by, they seemed to be spotlighting what we didn't have and they never offered to share. Perhaps it was just my perception because I was super hungry, but it seemed to me they were mocking us a bit at the very least. This suspicion was confirmed with some of the others later, so I wasn't alone.

IMO, inside jokes should stay inside to those that were there, but let's just say that Alfie's running joke(all weekend long) of offering free cavity searches with all manner of rubber gloves he had brought is definitely worth mentioning:



...maybe that was why the hunters all seemed so aloof? We may never know...I do know that between sickness, hunger and fear of free cavity searches, I slept terrible that night. When I did sleep, it was with terrible dreams and even Rusty mentioned in the morning that I was thrashing about most of the night. When I awoke, I immediately threw boots, helmet and rain gear on and went to survey the water levels. They were definitely down, although if the temp rose again, we would certainly see them surge as the snow melted. On return, we all elected to at least make a stab at getting out of there ASAP. The weather had cleared some, it wasn't raining, and I ate the last of my breakfast supplies while we all loaded up to try to head out:


Alfie's bike needed bump-starting, but once we took care of that we were on our way for better or worse:



A fog immediately started settling into the Havelock river valley, although wind was still and rain was not present yet:



Looking back on the group from where we had came from, the fog chasing us out of there:





I guess now is when I should mention that I grew up in Arizona, USA...and very rarely do we get to ride in water - maybe once or twice a year at most. Even on rides I have done in Colorado and Idaho, water crossings are generally rare and far between. Certainly nothing like here in NZ, where you can't see the bottom and the depth is really hard to read. I think I did more water-crossing this weekend than I have in my entire riding career previously, combined. And to say that the current there was fast would also be an understatement. SE950 demonstrates:



Transalper surfs the waves on his little quarter-liter WR:



Trying to find ways across, I was ahead of the group and wheelied across a narrow, but deep channel and the current promptly took me down and most of the way under. Another major miscalculation, and another learning experience. I was able to right the bike before it gulped water and get footing to hold it there before it died, but I was in a fast flow that was well over the bottom of the airbox. The current had turned me almost 120 degrees around, so that I was on the downstream side of the bike holding it against the standing wave now upstream of it. I had fallen in to the water far enough that inside my helmet visor I watched the water momentarily fill and air escape, just like in a cartoon...LOL...and as a result I was pretty much soaked top and bottom now - I even had to squeeze the water out of my helmet liner.

Regardless, I thought at first that I could work it over to a shore but after a few minutes of fighting a buoyant bike and loose stones underneath my feet, I was only moving down the channel and not to either side. Initially, I motioned that I was OK to the others, but after a short while I couldn't feel my feet and started shivering and getting weaker. Matt rode across the channel at a safer spot much further up, and down the finger of shoreline nearest to me, and jumped in to help me get to the far shore...I thanked him heartily and got my bike started again(barely), but as I went to continue, he motioned me to help: his bike had sank axle-deep into quicksand where he had left it to help me! I helped him free it up and we all got going again, much less trusting of fast current and unreadable depth.


After countless channel crossings like above, we made it over to the Northeast side of the Havelock, just near the confluence of the Clyde....and met a stopping point. The final channel of the Havelock was really fast and easily thigh deep, ~10 meters across. We teamed one bike(Alfie's) across as a group, barely, with intent to send him for help if we could get him back across the Clyde as well. Unfortunately, the Clyde had gotten even milkier and swelled even further than the Havelock; even wading across as a group was really risky:



At this point, we decided to abandon this effort and rest up again. It could have whipped up more wind or snow at anytime during this effort, which would really have put us all at risk. We had heard from Reuben that there was one more hut along the first part of the Rangitata...cold, tired and ready to rest again, we all headed cautiously back across the many of the same crossings all over again, single file, checking to see that each got across safely. No taking chances or striking out on our own this time.


No bikes drowned and no other problems arose...I almost got stuck in quicksand again, and we all had nervous moments, but in the end we made it over to where we could see the hut. Some of the others beat us there, as Transalper was really struggling across the last boulder-strewn floodplain and I went back to help him across:



(camera pointed into driving rain and wind, sorry) After a good rest, he and I made it to the hut where the others informed us that the way out along the Rangitata did indeed exist! Apparently the hunters we had stayed with the nights before had taken passed ahead of us, indicating that they had likely known about it all along. Excited and now with a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel, we all headed up the hillside - cold, rain and wind be damned:



This track proved to be one of the best view and some of the best riding of the entire weekend. Looking back up the Rangitata valley, towards the confluence of the Clyde and Havelock shrouded by fog:



...another:



Looking down the Rangitata, we would definitely have been stranded if not for this way out...Rusty stops for dry gloves:



We eventually caught up with the hunters, who played completely blind/dumb to the route out :



After stopping to suit up in high-speed/cold/rain gear(and getting chewed out by the hunters for "spitting shingle and tearing up public tracks"...while they drive 4x4's through the mud? LOL), we headed for Mayfield for a much-needed hot stove, brew and chips in Mayfield:



After that, it was a long, cold hour and a half home. Rusty had no housekey, so after arriving home had to wait another hour and a half in we clothes and freezing temps outside his own hose to warm up. I got home stripped to my knickers in the garage, and took a 30 minute shower. I was in the early stages of hypothermia, mostly from my swim and cold feet earlier in the day, but also from the ride home and being sick to boot. Afterwards, I made some soup and after that, crashed on the couch. I had no choice but to take work off the following day, and by Thursday night had lost my voice completely...LOL.


To say it one more time: I could not have asked for a better crew to get lost, stranded, stuck, marooned and starve a bit with...everyone ultimately made the best of all of it, and we all came out with minimal injuries and really, no mechanical failures besides a couple of bent handguards, a busted throttle, and some dead/drowned GoPro cameras and mobile phones.