Alan and I had wanted to walk all of the Heaphy Track, but it crosses the Kahurangi National Park one way. There are shuttle companies, or companies that will move your vehicle for you, but they are pricey. By road, from one end of the Track to the other is almost 500 km. So we decided to drive to the west coast portion of the Track, then hike one day to the last hut, and hike out the next. We arrived at Kohaihai Friday evening (November 21) and this was the view from the van.
We knew the weather for our "hike in" day did not look good, and we waited out the rain in the morning. We started walking around 1PM, with 16 km ahead of us. We passed 3 sets of people on their way out, all of whom looked a bit beat up. They warned us that the path had washed out in some areas, but we could go around by the beach. We were certainly going to be cautious.
Some places that would normally have been creeks through the trail were deep, fast-flowing streams. Some we were able to go through, and some forced us down to the beach.
Then we ran into a wall of rock and debris. We thought that this must be the afore mentioned washout.
About 2 hours in, we ran into a river. Judging by the erosion around the edges, it had only just carved so deep a gully through the path. We looked upstream for a way across, then down towards the beach. We must have waited 30 minutes to see if the tide would make a difference, but the roughness of the ocean did not seem to diminish as low tide approached.
We turned around and walked back. For all that, our walk along the wild west coast was certainly beautiful.
We were fortunate enough to make it south to Westport that night, as the rain had flooded many a field and the rivers were high.
Some places that would normally have been creeks through the trail were deep, fast-flowing streams. Some we were able to go through, and some forced us down to the beach.
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