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Friday, July 30, 2010

Ruahines II

Last month, on our first trip into the Ruahines, we chose the Sunrise Hut Track; the most popular place to enter the park. It's a gradual (2+ hour) climb to the top, and if you run into trouble, there will always be someone walking by in the next hour.

Today, I opted for the closest entrance to the Ruahines (about 50k from our house): The Masters Shelter track. This track was more mountain climbing than walking. Aside from Nico (who walked the first 15 minutes with me), I saw no humans during the 3 and a half hour trip.

As the elevations increased, the landscape changed from forest to desert and back to forest again.




I like this picture:






Near the top, it was a bit like walking on a glacier.


A few pictures I shot on the way down:






Trail marker?


Wild goats!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

In my defense, I had just gotten off a graveyard shift, and hadn't slept. And Michael's pics don't do justice to the steepness of this trail. I eventually made it half as far as Michael, which was to the top of a ridge with great views! - Nicole