A Monday afternoon in the rain at Rasberry Flat.  Quentin, Emma and I met Eric and Graham and sorted our gear.  Emma was a late addition to the team so we threw in a bivy bag and tents for 4. The Matukituki was a usual slog up a cow valley, and at Pearl flat we headed up to Liverpool biv which was a nice quick climb with heavy ...

  The Paringa has to be one of the easier West Coast rivers to get up. Standing on the Paringa Bridge on SH6 no gorge sits between you and the mountains of the Hooker range. The farmland is even pretty tolerable! After a pleasant amble with overloaded packs, we spent the last few hours of Boxing Day at the Condons private hut, in the company ...

I'm lying upside down with my legs in the air. My pack is jammed against the slippery log I had been standing on five seconds earlier.  I stand up wincing and kicking myself for rushing. Up ahead I can hear Quentin burrowing into another thicket. The boat is only 10 minutes behind us but may as well be on the other side of Lake Te Anau. A few ...

Piking in Mt. Cook & why alpine watches should have VERY loud alarms   The pikers: Ollie, Andrea, Jeremy and Terra   After spending 2 days learning every possible version of 500 from Jeremy and playing a epic day long game of Monopoly with every one trying to buy Mt. Cook and Golden Bay and my dyslexic brain collapsing after 10 ...