Milford Track (November 26 to 29)

Milford Track (narrated by Michelle)

The Milford track was described by poet Rudyard Kipling as ‘the finest walk in the world’ and is known in New Zealand as one of the great hikes.  It takes 4 days to walk the 54km from the head of lake Te Anau to Sandfly point on Milford Sound.  You can either take the easy option and join a guided walk where all you need to carry is a rather small rucksack containing just your clothes as food, as bedding and a warm shower is provided in your accommodation, or the independent hiker option like we did where you need to carry everything you will need for the 4 days.

Day 1 : Te Anau to Clinton Hut

So we are all ready for our 4 day hike along the Milford Track.  As we are carrying everything we need for the trek our rucksacks are roughly the weight of a small child, but unlike the hikers we would see in Switzerland carrying a child in a special rucksack, my rucksack does not have legs and hence is sadly not going to walk part of the way for me! J  At least it can only get lighter as we eat the food.

We are starting out from the lakeside town of Te Anau so our journey begins with a 25 minute bus ride to Te Anau downs where you board a boat which will take us to glade wharf the start of the hike.  We are lucky with the weather and it is blue skies and sunshine.  This part of the lake sees about 3000mm of rain annually on about 200 days of the year, and if we had started yesterday we would have started our walk very wet indeed.  Mind you some fellow hikers did get wet as they ‘forget’ to tell you about the spray which will come up over the boat.

It is a pleasant one and a half hours walk to the hut through what looks like ancient forest with views along the Clinton river.

Pictures of the day:

Day 2 : Clinton Hut to Mintaro Hut

I think the whole hut got up at 6 AM this morning to start the hike!  So went our idea of sleeping till 7.  Todays hike is about 6 hours, but with taking hundreds of photos, admiring the waterfalls and dipping of feet in a lake it takes us more like 7.  The last hour is a nice uphill climb, which was quite tiring, but at least it means less uphill tomorrow when we tackle the pass.

Again we have sunshine but our hut ranger Ed tells us that they are expecting snow at the hut the following evening.

Pictures of the day:

Day 3 : Mintaro Hut to Dumpling Hut

Today is the big hike day, 900m of height gain as we climb over the Mackinnon Pass and then about 1000m descent into the Arthur Valley.

We start with a mixture of sun and cloud up the 11 zig zags which take you up to the pass.  It is just at the end of spring here in New Zealand and whilst we were walking we heard about 3 or 4 avalanches on the surrounding mountains.  This is the reason that we need to take the emergency track down into the Arthur Valley as the main track is still under avalanche risk and hence closed and a couple of weeks ago hikers were being helicoptered over the pass as it was impassable.

The view from the top is worth the climb with views back down the Clinton valley, which we had spent the last two days walking along, and our first view of the valley we will be walking down into.  At the top is the toilet with the best view in Fjordland and so that you can enjoy the view, they have even added a window, which you can see out of.  But more impressive is that this toilet is even stocked with toilet paper!!

At the bottom of the very steep and rugged emergency track we walk along a boarded walk section, which overlooks hundreds of waterfalls.  (Un)fortunately the route to the Sutherland falls is currently closed due to the active rock fall in the area, my feet certainly were very happy for the 1.5 hours less of walking today.  However you can still see the falls from the track.

Pictures of the day:

Day 4 : Dumpling Hut to Sandfly Point

They say you have not walked the Milford Track unless you have had some rain, and so day 4 was our rain day, at least all the wet weather gear I had just carried for 30km finally had a use J  However the rain does make the waterfalls on this part of the journey more impressive, sadly however it did mean that we missed the views on the boat ride across Milford Sound.

But we made it, 4 days, 54km with a really heavy rucksack in tow

Pictures of the day:

If you are considering walking the Milford Track a couple of things to consider.

1. You need to be reasonably fit, you are walking 6 to 8 hours a day carrying a 10-14kg heavy rucksack (unless you take the easier guided trek option where the rucksack will of course be lighter)
2. You need to like hiking.  Part of this track sees anywhere from 3000 to 7000mm of rain a year.  It could be you are hiking for 4 days in rain, and parts of the track are liable to flooding.  If you are a fair weather hiker only this is not the walk for you.
3. You need to book early.  The accommodation on the great hikes need to be booked in advance, and currently the trek is booked out till mid march, it is not possible to look at the weather forecast and decide when you arrive if you would like to do the hike.