17 December 2019

The Original Plan: Mason Bay to Freshwater
The New Plan: Big Hellfire to Mason Bay
Steps: 44,515
Floors Climbed: 77
Distance: 33.1km
Tantrums: 11

From the hut, the view looked out across to Benson peak and down across Ruggedy Flat, an inland marshy area I was due to trudge through the next day. My companions left early, while this morgenmuffel organised breakfast and packing up.

It started innocently enough along the ridge of the mountain chain as I was mainly enjoying the fruits of my ~~tantrums~~ labours hiking along the ridge and taking in the sweeping views down the coast on one side and inland towards Hananui /Mt Anglem on the other. It wasn't too windy either.

The descent down to Little Hellfire Beach took a while. Several hours of hobbling, 16 falls, 200 slips, 572 swear words and one rolled ankle. A doddle really! The map, even in retrospect, makes it look much more straight forward. Nope.

The beach was nice, I’ll give it that. The sand just right for walking on without sinking too much and that refreshing sea breeze with no sealions. Now I just had to go up and over the next hill to Mason Bay. Easy. Ha.

3 more rolled ankles, another dozen total falls and double the swear words I was over it (over everything actually). One fall I slid my way down, ploughed through a bunch of ferns and there was an old whale rib! How it got up the hill we'll never know, maybe someone took it as a souvenir on Mason Bay (naughty) and this is where they turfed the bloody thing because WHY. I left it there.

I arrived at Mason Bay, though how anyone gets to it down the mountain after it’s been raining is anyone’s guess! Almost impossible!

I got there after high tide had retreated so didn’t have to take the High Tide Route. Lots of rocks and stones to clamber over and one seal to avoid, sand was a blessing! Ambled along about 4km and followed the signs inland to the hut. 4km is a loooooong way on sand, not as long as mud but long in terms of monotony and things seeming closer than they are. Also, I couldn't tell exactly where my "there" was!

I was so caught up in my Cloud of Urgh, I forgot to take any photos after Little Hellfire Beach. I was immensely over it and frustrated with pretty much everything. The mud, the sand, the pack weight, the sandflies and the me. All equally annoying at times!

I finally found Duck Creek which flowed nicely across the beach and wasn't even ankle-deep, however as I found later I didn't have to cross it at all. So up and over some difficult sand dunes I finally saw a marker...on the other side of the creek. Yes, there was a nice wee track to the hut that I missed due to abysmal signage and Duck Creek was knee-deep when I crossed back over again 500m inland. What's that? Voices? OMG people!!!

Dinner was welcomed and I heated water to soak my feet, what a treat. A foot spa in the middle of BFN! At least this time I had some daylight hours to play with, and chat to some newbies as people often fly into Mason Bay (beach landing), "hike" to Freshwater and get the water taxi from there. I was tempted to arrange that water taxi from Freshwater but I know I would have regretted that decision.

Now my plan had been to make it here by dinnertime and thrash it out to Freshwater, but arriving at 9pm I had nothing left to give. As I said wearily to one day-hiker, "I have nothing nice to say about that day!"

So here's the problem, I'm still a day behind! I can't afford to risk walking North Arm to Oban on my last day as I could miss my flight if it takes longer than the brochure says..and let's be honest, it will! I also doubt I could pack in Freshwater to Oban in one day as that's a very un-Carlesque scenario based on recent experience. Mason Bay to Freshwater is easy-going (no it actually is) so I also don't want to waste time relaxing there for half a day.

So I sat there with my feet soaking in the makeshift Spa, studying my map, eating my freeze-dried amazingness and working on a plan. I came up with what seemed the best one, to walk to Freshwater and have lunch, then solider on as far as I could and camp out if I couldn't make it to North Arm...I knew North Arm was an impossible goal but if I could just get the mountain out of the way and get over the ridge I had a shot of getting to Oban in time. What's a night in a tent when there's a bed waiting for you the next night?

Matter settled, I hobbled bedwards to prepare for one crazy day (and that's saying a lot this hike).