THE UPLAND TRAIL

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21763, 31 March 1934, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE UPLAND TRAIL

BY KLSIE K. MOKTON

IN THE HEART OF THE WILD

Long and lovely are the twilights of Fiordland, but late and reluctant the rising of the morning sun over the wall of the mountains, so that the mists lie thick and white in the valleys and shadows are dark on the walls of the steep rttvines long after sunshine has flooded the outer world.

It was well after eight o'clock when we crept out of our sleeping bags at the Freeman camp, after our first night on the new Manapouri-Bradshaw Sound track, but the bush was still dim and shadowy and no dancing sunbeams mocked our late uprising as we ran down the track to the river. Just at the bend, a little way past camp, stretched a wide, deep pool, clear as glass, icily uninviting. To wade in would have been to shatter the highest resolution —the only way was to take it head first and swim till the cold struck through. Then a swift rub down, a hurried dressing and quick run back to camp that sent the warm blood racing through our veins, bringing a sense of well-being and exhilaration. Breakfast was ready when we returned, and from the wide fireplace came the gentle plopplop of porridge in a billy, the heartening odour of ham and eggs. and the faint, warm smell of toast gently browning in front of the glowing embers.

All the camps on this new route are well equipped and provisioned. There is 110 attempt at luxury, but every want is supplied, and the simple comforts of warmth, shelter and good food well maintained. Excellent judgment has been shown in the choice of situation for each of the three camps between Lake Manapouri and Bradsliaw Sound, the first being on the banks of the Freeman River, the second in a strip of birch forest on the shores of Lake Minerva and the third in a clearing at the foot of the Bedevere Falls, in the Camelot Valley, Minerva, Bedevere, Camelot—the names themselves, melodious and lovely, hold the charm of some old-world idyll, some minstrel lay sung when the world was young and bright and beautiful. Through Freeman Canyon

The mists still clinging to the high rock walls of the Freeman Canyon were silvering beneath the first glint of sunshine as we set out on the second stage of our journey, eight miles to Minerva Camp, just below the Fowler Pass. Very beautiful was the first stretch of a couple of miles along the river bank, a woodland way winding through the ferns, with birch' forests rising high and dark 011 the spurs of the mountains across the river, and the walls of the canyon closing in to precipitous heights beyond the vista of sunlit glades ahead. Two miles from camp we crossed the Freeman River again, this time by a well-made suspension bridge, then the track left the river, and we began a steady climb of one thousand feet through the bush. The sun had disappeared after one brief glimpse of brightness; the sky had clouded over and a light drizzle began to fall. The sides of the gorge drew closer and closer until a final steep pull brought us out 011 the crest of a high ridge, a rocky abutment which made a natural look-out. From this vantage point a magnificent panorama of forest and mountain was tinfolded. A thousand feet below the Freeman River roared through the narrowing walls of the canyon; beyond the forest-clad valley, dark against the clouded sky, rose the stupendous precipices and stark, knife-edge ridges of a vast wall of rock four thousand feet high, stretching in unbroken line for seven or eight miles. Here was one of the three really grand panoramas that lift this new scenic route far above the level of even the most beautiful of New Zealand's better-known tourist tracks, and give it rank with the Milford Walk, long-famed as one of the loveliest, if not the loveliest, in all the world. From the Lookout we descended to the Switchback, where the walls of the gorge close together and the track runs beneath overhanging cliffs that tower a thousand feet above the winding way. In Alpine Uplands

Reaching river level once more, we passed through a series of exquisite moss glades, beautified by the fine rain that had been falling stea'dily for over an hour, each filament of moss and fern beaded with minute silvery pearls that would change to glittering diamonds when the sun shone out again. Running now through easy river-bank grades, the track led past the picturesque Ranfurlv Falls, beautifully set in the natural frame of a group of birch trees, descending in one foaming leap of sixty feet to a river bed of huge moss-grown boulders. Another climb, and we came out of the forest and into an alpine upland of birch groves and mountain sedges. High in the hills we made our way along the shores of Lake Freeman, green as jade, encircled by groves of birch, a dark clouded lake, deep and brooding beneath the shadow of the mountains. A splendid panorama of mountain, forest and lake was unfolded as we neared the end of the day's walk and came at last to the Mirror Pool, at the foot of Lake Minerva. Lake Minerva Here, beneath sunset's clearing sky, we looked upon a scene so majestic, so lovely that every other impression of beauty was eclipsed. Directly ahead rose the rugged heights of the Hydra Range, a strange, jumbled mass of soaring granite precipices, rounded domes and jagged peaks, rising in one majestic ciroue that swept within its mighty walls all the beauty of forest, lake ancl river as far as the eye could reach. Prominent in that broken line of stupendous heights, most of them unclimbed and unnamed, were the three or four peaks conquered bv climbers— Mo unt Fowler, overlooking the Fowler Pass, Medusa, six thousand feet and highest of them all and the soaring crests of Mounts Malcolm and Clinkard. Mirrored in the silver shield of the little pool, and again in the depths of Minerva, this mountain panorama holds only one rival, that which sweeps down the Clinton Valley and across the Valley of the Arthur, from MacKinnon Pass, on the Milford Track. Very lovely was Lake Minerva as we made our way round the shining quartz sand beaches and rock-strewn shores to the upland glade that sheltered the little camp at the end of the second stage of this wonderful Fiordland walk. Here again, in the heart of the mountains, was warmth and comfort, beds this time, not of moss, but of dried birch leaves, and once again the softest of eiderdown sleeping bags. Across the silence of nightfall came the cry of kiwi and weka, a sighing of wind in the trees and presently the soft rustle of raindrops pattering down through the thick birch foliage overhead.

Heavier and heavier fell the rain, louder and wilder the voices of wind and storm. Snug and warm we lay and listened, but with dismay in our hearts. The weather had broken —what of our climb over the Pass, the rough, eightmile descent to the Camclot on the morrow?