Pelorus Bridge – Captain Creek Hut

Aaaaand we are back to rude 06 o’clock awakenings. I left the shower dripping with both water and dread, knowing that the next one would be around Christmas – nine days away. Toby and I + the Swiss boys split into pairs, trying our luck getting a hitch on separate ends of town. We looked so darn cute, but somehow failed to charm the locals. After hitching in the US I’d grown accustomed to getting rides at the blink of an eye, why was New Zealand being so iffy? After about 200 cars had passed us with me muttering after them “Have a nice day sir…. IN HELL!”, we slinked back to Blue Moon Backpackers and persuaded one of the hostel workers to stuff us in his tiny car. You don’t know what intimacy is before you’ve hitched with four thru-hikers and their (already) smelly gear.

Once at Pelorus Bridge (The Hobbit location!), team Swiss went to pick up their resupply box while Toby and I hit the spectacularly long road walk ahead. Soon the sun was blazing overhead as we powered through endless farmland into the hills. Thru-hiker conversations typically centre around food or gear, but soon Toby and I found ourselves unveiling our innermost thoughts to each other. He revealed shocking and devastating things about his past in a Christian cult in Edmonton. The trail was an escape for him, a chance to set out his own course and defy the pointless limits that had dictated his life. To my surprise, I felt like the worldly one, asking probing questions, deconstructing his opinions and judgements. Up until now I had always been the seeking one, grabbing answers with both hands, willing them to lead me. But for the first time ever, I felt sort of… settled, as if I’d found my place in the world.

I think the trail is a good place to vent such thoughts. We are all equally alone in traversing long miles and feeling the same pains, most of us are very far from home. At the road’s end and the official start of the Pelorus River Track, it became very clear that the big miles we’d dished out on the QCT were history. The track deteriorated with every km. The trail itself slanted downward at a calf-killing angle, and constant roots and ledges made for extremely slow going. We crawled about for a couple of hours until we reached a signpost for “The Emerald Pools”. Without a moment’s hesitation we threw down our packs and bolted for the greenstone-coloured pools in the Pelorus River. The first two seconds were absolute bliss. The water was gorgeous and cool on our boiling bodies.

However. We were now in sandfly country. This infamous beast stalks the mountains and riverlands of the South Island, sucking the life out of unsuspecting tourists. Suddenly the air was black with them, and our moment of peace turned into panic as we scrambled up the stony shores and tried to wriggle back into our clothes before the flesh was eaten off our bones. I cursed as they bit into my ankles, knowing they would be a recurring feature of the TA for a good while now. Back on the trail, I was stopped dead by a chestnut-sized spider in the middle of my path. I poked at it with my trekking pole, expecting it to flee. But the monster reared up on its hind legs and thrashed at me! I screamed and leapt around it, not slowing down until I was certain Little Shelob was safely behind me.

Reaching Captain Creek Hut felt more like a necessity than a victory. The hut was tiny, old and stifling hot. A quick once-over of the many spiderwebs sent me pitching my tent in the sandfly-infested meadow outside. The American hiker South was already there, enjoying his third cup of hot cocoa while pitching his hammock in the trees. We all spent some agonising hours inside the hut, holding bottles filled with cool river water against our faces and stomachs. The QCT suddenly seemed very civilised. Being out here in a shallow gorge in the midst of thick forest was a paradigm shift away from the lofty ridges along the coast. We retreated to our moist tents as twilight settled, to the faint sound of South humming behind the trees.