Milford Track

Day 1

Day 2

Unsure of the way....

Day 3

Nic enjoying the sunshine

Getting ready to go over the tops!

Day 4

The end!

The Milford Track has been described at one of the finest walks in the world. It's heavily regulated by the DOC and at only 53.5km (33 miles) over four days makes it easily accessible to almost anyone willing to give it a go. Because of these reasons the track is often booked up months in advance and the huts are nearly always full. This was the most commercial and controlled hike we would complete.

We were following in the footstep of the Maori who used this route through the mountains to get to their precious greenstone. We caught a bus and a boat to get to the start of the track and got on with the first days hike - a tortorous one hour walk to the first hut! The second day was a little tougher and we began walking our way up through the valley, enjoying huge waterfalls and seeing the msit gently lift as the sun finally found it's way to us. Unlike the Kepler and Routburn which gets it's big hill section out of the way at the very beginning, the Milford's mountain doesn't come until the third day. This was a fantastic day, we immediately began our climb straight from the hut. Up, up we walked, into a huge mass of cloud. The wind was getting stronger and had a real bite to it and by the time we were near the summit we were quickly climbing into our waterproof gear and winter woolies. The scenery was very moody, ice covered the grass and rocks and a thick cloud blocked out any views there were to be had. After a very brief exploration of the summit we continued along the top, hoping Nic wouldn't get blown off before we reached the shelter for a quick cuppa. The descent was completely different. The cloud slowly cleared, the wind stopped and the sun came out - we got brilliant views of the surrounding snow capped peak as we made our way down into the valley. We dropped by Sutherland Falls, New Zealand's highest and the world's fifth highest waterfall at 580m. Our last day was spent walking out of the valley, past Mackay Falls and Bell Rock (a huge hollow boulder) and savoring the end of our Great Walks.