The Routeburn Track!

Hi everyone! Sorry I haven't posted in a few days so I'll try to catch you all up! So last weekend 3 friends and I packed up the car and headed off to Queenstown! We had about a 4 hour drive until we were in beautiful Queenstown! We walked around the city and I showed them around to the sites, because I was the only one that had been there before. We then of course had a Fergburger, the best hamburger in the world, got directions to the campsite and drove off into the wilderness! But actually though.... We were in the middle of nowhere. And we got lost, very lost. It was pitch black outside, we hadn't seen civilization in about an hour and we couldn't find the camp ground. We ended up driving 40 minutes up into the back country of Mount Aspiring National Park to where the Lord of the Rings filmed in the Fangorn Forest and Isanggard. That was pretty cool, but we eventually found our way down sketchy back country dirt roads to the Lake Sylvan camp ground. We pitched our tents and settled in for some well deserved rest. At around 1:00am we were gently awakened by the rest of the tramping club showing up on their buses and setting up their tents for another hour. The next morning we got up early and headed to the start of the Routeburn track which is one of New Zealand's famous Great Walks. It was raining a little but nothing too severe so we kept on. We hiked about an hour to the Flats Hut, one of the first stops on the Routeburn. We took some pics and had a snack and continued on. Then the track changed dramatically. Before the track was a rolling up and down with nothing too bad but all of the sudden we were going straight up. We kept walking straight up for about two and a half hours until we finally made it to the Routeburn falls hut, the second stop on the great walk. We again stopped briefly to take pictures and fill up our water bottles. The falls were a beautiful sight with bright blue water cascading down into lush green rainforest. Once we moved on from the falls we were at a high enough altitude that we were above the tree line and into the alpine scrub forest. This landscape was nestled in a high altitude valley with small kettle lakes from glacial run off all over the place, and high peaks of mountain on either side. We scampered over boulders and across rivers, with the occasional stop to fill up our water bottles straight from the stream! We finally got up to the Harris saddle, the mountain pass that on one side had Mount Aspiring national park and the other looks down at Fiordlands national park. There was a small shelter there to stop, get out of the wind and have lunch at. We then moved on to climb straight up onto the top of one of the peaks to Conical Hill. We climbed up and spent an hour just looking out at the view and taking funny pictures. Then we began the long journey down the mountain. The sun finally came out as we began climbing off the mountain, so I had to stop every few steps to retake all of my previous pictures. Once we were back down beneath the bush line the trail became more well managed and so naturally I ran down! It was so fun and actually much easier! Once we were back down to the river flats we stopped and changed into swim suits. I jumped right into a glacial river! It was freezing!! But so much fun, I loved it! The rivers are just so clear and blue! We eventually made it all the way back to the car and drove back to the camp site. That night was so much fun. There were about 90 students all in the tramping club there, we had a cooking contest, worm wrestling (Where two people have to put sleeping bags on and then cant use their arms to wrestle, it was comedy), and of course beautiful star gazing. Out in the middle of nowhere there was an amazing view of the stars, the southern cross and the milky way! Everyone eventually went to sleep, and I slept like a rock! After an 11 hour hike I was exhausted! We got up around 9 the next day, went to Queenstown for some breakfast and made the journey home. So far my best weekend I have had since being in New Zealand!