Day 78-79 | Geraldine & New Years
30/31 December 2022
One of the hottest days on trail is followed by one of the coldest: Today.
The Rangiriri river valley - a river that is very hard to cross by foot- is coming up and we have already booked a shuttle to take us to the town of Geraldine for New Years and then up again at the other side of the river after on 1st of January.
A French girl at Royal Hut said that there’s another river just before that that it currently difficult to cross due the tcan be crossed but water would reach up to the hip. Though we had done this kind of crossings before and would do this anytime again on a nice day, we do not really feel like it on a slightly rainy and foggy day like today. There seems to be an alternative trail avoiding that. It would go over a saddle and start just a couple of kilometers after our campsite.
When walking towards the turn off, a female hiker crosses our path and we learn that she just came that way. It’s a good walk just a bit cold at the top, she says. She is wearing big gloves. The track starts easy, steadily climbs and the misty clouds have something magical. My hands start getting cold and I put them into the pockets of my rain jacket beneath my rain poncho. Further up it starts raining, a very cold rain. I just look at my feet and focus on moving quickly.
The saddle comes into sight and the wind picks up. There are a few patches of snow after the saddle. It’s freezing cold and we quickly head down. The thought of changing clothes in a nearby hut keeps me going but it turns out that the hut is off trail and we decide against going there (it also is a private hut and most probably closed). I still decide to stop to put on my rain pants against the wind and another long sleeve but my hands are so cold that I can hardly open the zippers of my pants. I am desperate and feel like crying. But it is what it is and the only way out of this is walking.
Roughly four hours later we get to the road. As we are now ahead of our schedule and have no phone reception, the shuttle would only come the next day so the only option to get to town today is hitch hiking. The road looks so deserted that getting a ride seems like a miracle. Who would head up a gorge that is basically a one way street without exit?
A young farmer passes by and offers to take us a few kilometers further. When he drops us off by a holiday home, he mentions that an open WiFi conncection at the house that we could use to make a phone call. While I head up to the house, Phil stays by the road just in case. I have just connected to the WiFi when a car pulls over. It’s volunteers that help maintain backcountry mountain huts directly heading to Geraldine. Bingo!
