The Copland track
You may travel NZ from one end to the other, but nowhere else will you find, at the end of a long ride through virgin forests, a comfortable little hut in a green valley encircled by rock walls with jagged peaks mounting thousands of feet into the sky, where, under the shadow of eternal snows, you may take an open-air bath in a delicious warm pool behind a screen of native trees. NZ Herald 1913.
Welcome Flat hut
One of the hot pools and surrounding mountians
This Waitangi weekend I escaped away to the great outdoors, the beauty of our country. Location: West Coast, the Copland track leading to Welcome Flat hut. The draw card: natural hot pools at the end, plus all the standard tramping goodness such as the bush, rivers, mountains, road trips, good times with friends, and making new ones. Me, Jane Macky, Jane’s flatmate Hailey, and Nicola Lowe left Dunedin on Friday at about 6pm. We set up camp at a DOC campsite 30 minutes past Wanaka, the ground was super hard. The night was restless, there was a strange animal making noises outside. The next morning we couldn’t agree on what the noises were, I thought it was a clucking sound and sometimes growls (like what animal makes both of those noises?! a scary one surely!), whilst Jane0 thought it was heavy breathing... obviously a giant sand fly then. 6am we rose to the cell phone alarm that was much more perky than I. Hailey is a morning person and was up so fast that I was actually confused by it. We drove about 2.5hrs to the start of the track where we meet up with Vanessa and Hamish (a couple from Christchurch, who I didnt know).
From back to front: Hailey, Jane, Hamish, Vanessa, Nicola
6-7hr to Welcome Flat hut, so the sign declared. Hamish was pumped to do it in 5. It took us 6.5 including lunch. The track went through bush, as you’d expect, and pretty much followed a river up the valley, the water was a milky blue. It looked very refreshing, especially considering the great sunshine beating down on us. We had such good weather especially considering it rains lots on the West Coast. There were lots of little streams to cross which was fun, jumping from bolder to bolder to stone to bolder to stone and to land. There were about 8 cars at the car park and we were worried off not getting a mattress at the hut, I desperately wanted a mattress because I wanted at least one good sleep out of 3, I knew on the floor that wouldn’t happen. The hut was very full but we all got a mattress. Sweet! The hot pools were great, especially after dark when the stars were out and the sand flies in bed. The walk in was pretty tiring so it was great to relax. Jane carried in a bottle of wine! Ha silliness but it was good. Nicola was horrified at her absolute forgetfulness when she arrived at the hut and discovered she had no sleeping bag. But actually Jane0 had taken pity on the sore sate of Nic’s back and so stole the sleeping bag and carried it in for her (0 what sacrifice), a great joke and we gleefully played along for 20 minutes till we were caught.
Just as you'd expect, its a phone in the bush.
The hottest hot pool
The walk out on Sunday was a lot easier, more down hill. We then went to Fox Glacier township for dinner (30 minutes away), which was a bit of a down moment cause we couldn’t find a cheap place, plus we had milkshake cravings near the end of the tramp and the only place that sold them was closed. We settled for expensive fish n chips form an actually restaurant and flavored milk. It was raining lightly as well. But Oh the Oasis saved me from the gloom. I mean the camping ground saved us, hot shower, bright lights, warmth, boiling water on Zip... wonderful. Though another restless night, the tent was too short for me but I forced it to comply.
Monday we parted from Hamish and Vanessa who went back to Christchurch, whilst we ventured to Franz Joseph Glacier and walked up to it. So. many. tourists. the girls tried to get “free information” by tagging along with a tour group, but they chickened out, and I was too cool to play those games. I’d been there before, so I thought, but it looked different, the track up to the glacier was defiantly different. Im still confused to whether It was Fox of Franz that I had previously been to. The West Coast is so rugged, they have power polls that look like they have never been updated. Its cool, even the animals on the farms look more rugged. The houses and the vehicles (not that there were many) definitely looked a bit worn. On the way back we had lunch at the same place we camped on Friday night. Eat, swim, stress stress, and finally sorted see previous post for more details.
In summary, I would say the actual tramp wasn’t as good as the Routeburn we did last year just because it didn’t have any of the amazing views, but we did it for the hot pools which made it worth it. On the other side it was good to have an extra day after the tramp to do other stuff. And we had plenty of laughs and good conversation twas great. Also I was inspired to do a couple of other things 1) Climb a glacier one day, the photos looked amazing, could do that in NZ or overseas. 2) Really want to go to War Birds over Wanaka this Easter (we saw it advertised in Fox)... so who wants to go? It’ll be awesome!
Me facing Franz Joseph Glacier
Welcome Flat hut
One of the hot pools and surrounding mountians
This Waitangi weekend I escaped away to the great outdoors, the beauty of our country. Location: West Coast, the Copland track leading to Welcome Flat hut. The draw card: natural hot pools at the end, plus all the standard tramping goodness such as the bush, rivers, mountains, road trips, good times with friends, and making new ones. Me, Jane Macky, Jane’s flatmate Hailey, and Nicola Lowe left Dunedin on Friday at about 6pm. We set up camp at a DOC campsite 30 minutes past Wanaka, the ground was super hard. The night was restless, there was a strange animal making noises outside. The next morning we couldn’t agree on what the noises were, I thought it was a clucking sound and sometimes growls (like what animal makes both of those noises?! a scary one surely!), whilst Jane0 thought it was heavy breathing... obviously a giant sand fly then. 6am we rose to the cell phone alarm that was much more perky than I. Hailey is a morning person and was up so fast that I was actually confused by it. We drove about 2.5hrs to the start of the track where we meet up with Vanessa and Hamish (a couple from Christchurch, who I didnt know).
From back to front: Hailey, Jane, Hamish, Vanessa, Nicola
6-7hr to Welcome Flat hut, so the sign declared. Hamish was pumped to do it in 5. It took us 6.5 including lunch. The track went through bush, as you’d expect, and pretty much followed a river up the valley, the water was a milky blue. It looked very refreshing, especially considering the great sunshine beating down on us. We had such good weather especially considering it rains lots on the West Coast. There were lots of little streams to cross which was fun, jumping from bolder to bolder to stone to bolder to stone and to land. There were about 8 cars at the car park and we were worried off not getting a mattress at the hut, I desperately wanted a mattress because I wanted at least one good sleep out of 3, I knew on the floor that wouldn’t happen. The hut was very full but we all got a mattress. Sweet! The hot pools were great, especially after dark when the stars were out and the sand flies in bed. The walk in was pretty tiring so it was great to relax. Jane carried in a bottle of wine! Ha silliness but it was good. Nicola was horrified at her absolute forgetfulness when she arrived at the hut and discovered she had no sleeping bag. But actually Jane0 had taken pity on the sore sate of Nic’s back and so stole the sleeping bag and carried it in for her (0 what sacrifice), a great joke and we gleefully played along for 20 minutes till we were caught.
Just as you'd expect, its a phone in the bush.
The hottest hot pool
The walk out on Sunday was a lot easier, more down hill. We then went to Fox Glacier township for dinner (30 minutes away), which was a bit of a down moment cause we couldn’t find a cheap place, plus we had milkshake cravings near the end of the tramp and the only place that sold them was closed. We settled for expensive fish n chips form an actually restaurant and flavored milk. It was raining lightly as well. But Oh the Oasis saved me from the gloom. I mean the camping ground saved us, hot shower, bright lights, warmth, boiling water on Zip... wonderful. Though another restless night, the tent was too short for me but I forced it to comply.
Monday we parted from Hamish and Vanessa who went back to Christchurch, whilst we ventured to Franz Joseph Glacier and walked up to it. So. many. tourists. the girls tried to get “free information” by tagging along with a tour group, but they chickened out, and I was too cool to play those games. I’d been there before, so I thought, but it looked different, the track up to the glacier was defiantly different. Im still confused to whether It was Fox of Franz that I had previously been to. The West Coast is so rugged, they have power polls that look like they have never been updated. Its cool, even the animals on the farms look more rugged. The houses and the vehicles (not that there were many) definitely looked a bit worn. On the way back we had lunch at the same place we camped on Friday night. Eat, swim, stress stress, and finally sorted see previous post for more details.
In summary, I would say the actual tramp wasn’t as good as the Routeburn we did last year just because it didn’t have any of the amazing views, but we did it for the hot pools which made it worth it. On the other side it was good to have an extra day after the tramp to do other stuff. And we had plenty of laughs and good conversation twas great. Also I was inspired to do a couple of other things 1) Climb a glacier one day, the photos looked amazing, could do that in NZ or overseas. 2) Really want to go to War Birds over Wanaka this Easter (we saw it advertised in Fox)... so who wants to go? It’ll be awesome!
Me facing Franz Joseph Glacier
posted by Justin at
9:47 am
