Valley of the Horses

March 7

Anne Hut to Christopher Hut

KM 5km west of 2042

Distance: 14km 

Elevation: descent 100m

Steps: 21,400

Time: 9:10am - 1:05pm

Today we had a very intentionally short day in order to visit a bit of a nostalgic place - Christopher Hut on the St James Walkway. 

Yes, we were on the St James Walkway yesterday, but as discussed, Eliza didn't remember that part of it. She and Vaughan both definitely remember Christopher Hut, though, and the valley with beautiful views and a herd of mostly-wild horses.

That comes after the lovely, moody trail that led away from Anne Hut. The moodiness came largely from the low cloud that persisted throughout today, lending a sense of scale to the landscape that might otherwise get get lost in its immensity. 

One of the first things we did was cross a bridge, and found this evidence that humans are not the only animals that use this bridge to cross the river. Anyone able to identify the coprolite culprit here? We are a bit stumped, we wouldn't think too many animals would want to use a wire bridge like this.

It's also nice to see slightly different signage. We still have the bright orange triangles, and cones on top of stakes in fields, but it is kind of cool to see more, well, explicit track markings.

It was after this that we turned up into the valley that we remembered so fondly. At the pace we were going yesterday, we probably could have done today's hike in around 3 hours, but we decided on purpose to take it very slowly, really enjoying the scenery, even getting started a bit later than normal to get the feel of a leisurely day.

Seeing the hut brought back all of the wonderful memories of our first through-hike, and even the inside of it felt a bit like coming home, or coming back to a favourite holiday spot - even though we've only been there once.

A bit later in the afternoon, after Vaughan had a nap, Eliza had done some stretching, reading and knitting, we walked down to the nearby river and got to look at the horse herd.

The clouds are keeping it cool enough that we were hoping to be able to light a fire at the hut tonight, but it seems like the flue is pretty much blocked, so unfortunately we won't be able to have the fire without smoking ourselves out of the hut - which is not quite worth it.

Tomorrow, we are heading back toward Waiau pass, going to either Waiau Hut or hopefully a bit past that to Waiau Forks, and campsite just shy of the pass. The pass itself is very steep and technical, so the estimated pace to cross is... very slow. If we can make it to the campsite, we will rejoin with Linsey, who decided to go straight to Waiau Hut for tonight; based on our descriptions though, she is already planning on coming back to do the St James Walkway in its entirety sometime soon.