The day was overcast and dreary with frequent rain squalls. It was exactly what I expected from the previous three days of coastal weather and what the DOC office in Halfmoon Bay had predicted. The trail was muddy, full of twisted roots and ankle hazards and it seemed to climb forever. Even when we were headed down hill we were climbing up and over trees and other fungus encrusted forest fodder.
Iain settled into the weight of his pack more quickly and gracefully than I did. I slipped and slid through the mud puddles for the first half of the day, diligently trying to dodge the bigger boggy sections. I learned my lesson by the end of the day – it’s easier on your body and your mind to just power through most of them. However, I was still attempting to stay somewhat clean on hiking day one. I was sure I would be the first woman to come through the Stewart Island Northern Circuit Trek unscathed. HA!
We stopped for lunch in the shelter of the trees at Lucky Beach. We ate some of our weightier food (the luxury of canned fish with no fear of bears or cougars following our trail!) battling the sand flies while we weren’t moving. Then it was into the sideways rain and miserable wind on the slick rocky beach. For twenty minutes I missed the mud while we scrabbled along the high tide line, then we were back in the forest and I took back every charitable thought I’d had.
An hour or so before we made it to Yankee River Hut I fell face first towards the mud, almost leaving one boot behind me. That was when I lost my temper. I had a completely illogical and useless temper tantrum in my head and poor Iain was left following me as I stormed along the trail. Twenty minutes later I finally ran out of energy and cried out all of my frustration into Iain’s shoulder. I believe he had a moment of panic imagining eight more days of hellish dramatics with a hiking prima dona…but I managed to suck up the last shreds of my dignity and keep slogging forwards.
We made it to the hut well before sunset and found a hot fire and four friendly hunters waiting for us. We had passed the rest of our fellow hikers during the day so we were the first group to meet the old guys. They were a funny group, happy to share their boiling water with us and full of stories about the island and other hikers that had passed through the area while they’d been there. Before too long we were joined by the other mud-farers, three of the guys continued on to the next hut and we met a new couple that had choppered in to Christmas Village like us. Iain taught me the considerate camper’s hut etiquette of always gathering wood for the fire and it earned us a cold coke from the hunters.
It was a quiet evening for all of us. The sun made a belated appearance just before it set and we got to see one of the phantom white-tailed deer in the evening light. It tantalized the hunters for a brief moment, then with a flick of its tail it ghosted across the beach and disappeared into the dense manuka forest without a single shot fired. We fell asleep to the rowdy sounds of four old men swapping stories of bigger and better hunting while besting each other at cribbage.
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