There was still quite a bit of mid-semester to go so my second mission was to go on a tramp. Joe was keen but no one else was so well... this is the adventure in Joe's words.


So on Sunday night armed with a 1:50,000 map of Dunedin and area we sat down to plan out tramp around the Silver Peaks. About an hour later we had a nice little 2 day loop all sorted out, drive in, walk in to stay at Jubilee hut one night then walk out the long way back to the road. Easy....
So Tuesday morning we set off down to Unipol to get a cooker only to discover they were out. Then some guy walked in the door with a cooker to return. Timing!! He even gave us a gas canister too. Things were looking up.
Fast forward a few hours.
Walked for a while and stopped at Pulpit Rock for lunch, just down the track we passed a older couple who looked at us then said with a knowing sort of grin “Oh I'm pretty sure you two will have the hut to yourselves”. What was that supposed to mean?

On top of Pulpit Rock

Fast forward another few hours, Stopping for a breather while going down the Devil's Staircase. Another couple were walking up and stopped for a chat. Again with that same knowing sort of grin and wink we where assured the hut would be ours for the night. I guess that a young lady and a young man tramping together looks suggestive (complete with a bottle of ginger wine strapped to the outside of Kasey's pack).



So got to the hut, eventually.... (man alive they need a few more signs up that ways!) and proceeded to just chill out like one does at the end of the day. But who should show up but Cleo and Nicky from the Uni tramping club.

Jubilee Hut

Inside of the hut

Another shot of the inside

So after the usual dinner of pasta and sausages we had another look at the map for tomorrows walk out. The only snag was the route we wanted to follow went around the long way and as we all know the shortest distance is a straight line... So we had decided to do a spot of bush bashing from ABC cave to meet the track...
Lesson number 1 – Look at the contour lines on maps.
Lesson number 2 – When D.O.C says something is a route and not formed they aren't kidding around. Spent a good amount of time the second day just looking for the track.

Random dead pig speared on a trail marker... yummy!

Pretty ridge line... this area seemed so remote even though civilization was mere kilometers away

Anyway after walking up for a ways and following a ridge we came across some guys cutting gorse along the sides of the track. So we told them what our plans were and the comment was “Oh yeah, got a bit of a walk ahead of you then. You'll get wet feet following that creek up too”. That should have started alarm bells.
So we went down 300m from our ridge to cross a river then up 300m again. Oh did I mention it was drizzling so the ground was a tad slippery under foot. Interesting times I tell you.
After getting to the road we make the choice of taking off down a side track to follow Carey's Creek upstream to where the car was parked rather than following the boring road. Hehe, would regret that later on.

Following a creek up is highly entertaining and I recommend it to all. Just make sure you have plenty of time and energy. The track just kept on going and going. Admittedly it was the end of the day but it felt like the longest walk I have ever done. Thanks to daylight saving finishing we also had to finish the tramp in the dark, trying to follow a route in the bush in the dark going uphill is also something that I'll remember for a very long time. In the end we did make it, slightly wiser and muddier. Not a tramp to take your misses on for a romantic getaway but a very beautiful part of the country and close to Dunedin. Recommended to all.
- Joe


Yep... good times with my friend Joe.

Sweaty, dirty and dog-tired but happy to be reunited with the Blue Beast (aka Joe's car)

Since I didn't have much of a chance to make plans for mid-semester break I ended up in Dunedin with a mission to entertain myself for the whole week. One of my goals was to find the glow worms that I had heard about that were in walking distance from the university. I set out around 4 o'clock with rough directions I had found online. It started raining after five minutes of leaving my flat and didn't let up the whole time I was out there. It took about an hour and a half to get to the track but I had flowers and gardens to look at and a nice iPod shuffle mix to accompany it.

Pretty flowers alongside the road

Beautiful house and garden... I would love to have something like this at my own *future* house

I had been considering turning back for a while before I saw the track sign because it was getting dark and there was no shoulder on the road I was walking on. The rain didn't help either. I had a mission though so I soldiered on and found the track sign pointing upward at the muddy trail.

7 minutes? No problem. I headed up in the darkening woods and followed the markers to a stream. I didn't see any signs for glowworms so I continued up the stream and clambered over boulders until I was in the bed of the stream with steep, stone walls on either side and dark green vegetation blocking out the last of the light above. I stopped here thinking that this was far too difficult to be a seven minute journey. I also started thinking about Gollum and those terrifying hissing words of Tolkien seemed to echo around the place.

So I turned back, dejected that I had walked all this way through the rain and found no glow worms. Just as I was about to leave, I turned back for one last look and caught a glinting blue light in the leaves. Success! A small colony of glow worms were there for my viewing pleasure. They were so tiny... like little LEDs stuck in the mossy underside of the overhanging rock.

Wednesday Walkies:

This is something that the Otago University Tramping Club puts on every week with a senior member taking whoever wants to go on a short walk somewhere nearby Dunedin. Since I've got a lab on Wednesday I usually miss out but lab ended early and I booked it out of there in time to catch the group.

We started out straight from the university and it was about an hour's walk to get to the start of the trail. I was surprised by the length of the trail since it was steadily getting darker (we left at about 5) and we hadn't even reached our peak with the lookout over the greater Dunedin area. We missed the sunset by a few minutes and stars were coming out when we gathered at the top making photos pretty much impossible. Tea was possible and our leader Pete brought forth a huge pot and all the fixings from his pack. It was really nice sitting on the peak with a hot cup of tea and looking out over the city lights.

Peak markers make great stove tops

The way back down was easy going but more exciting with the use of headlamps. A few tumbles and swears later we had reached the bottom and went out separate ways at around 10pm. I wish I could do more of these sort of hikes because they really break the week up nicely and provide a convenient escape into nature.

Taking a short cut through a logging area as instructed by our leader Pete