Milford Track (Day 2)

By Jenny M on April 14, 2014

I’m good to go off 8hrs of sleep (well typically even less). So hitting the sack at 9 the night before would have me jumping out with the early birds. Early birds? Where are the early birds? They are always there when you don’t need them, but in this case I’m lying awake and counting down the minutes (Well actually, I think my bladder was the one counting down the minutes). So by 7am my bladder gave up and got me up and out whilst my beloved Jenny was still blissfully sleeping!

By 9:30 we had finally hit the road. Jenny commented on the fact she loved travelling with me, as for once, she is waiting on me rather than the other way around. I hadn’t factored in that without makeup, Jenny can be ready in 5 min rather than the 2 hrs she would normally require. I can now appreciate why she loves hiking!

Today the temperature was again cool, overcast and forecast of afternoon rain. So we took no chances and prepared ourselves for the worst, which incidentally didn’t eventuate until after our arrival at Mintaro Hut later in the day.

This section of the track had us walk over 16km up the valley towards the Mackinnon pass (Which we would tackle the following day). The scenery was spectacular with the rugged mountains dwarfing us on either side of the valley floor. The landscape was truly amazing to witness.

We had only just settled ourselves in at the Mintaro hut when Jenny thought she heard thunder. We immediately jumped up and raced outside to witness an Averlanche across the other side of the valley (Thank goodness as the location of our hut was nestled in against the opposite
mountain range). The avalanche was relatively small and high up but was reported in by our hut warden who claimed he hadn’t witnessed one himself before!

After the commotion and the cooking and eating were done it was off to bed at 9! Again, no entertainment was found to keep me up longer and the rain had started to fall quite heavily!

Caught on camera for Charles…