January 25, 2010

A Prince in the bush…………nearly.

Dear Prince William

Please join Graeme and me on The Big Walk.

Much love

Jo-anne

Dear Jo-anne

I can’t join you on The Big Walk but why don’t you come to my barbie in Wellington.

Much love

William

Anyway, this is the story Jo-anne tells which led to us leaving the bush at Nelson Lakes and flying to Wellington for a brief royal sojourn. We found the Prince to be a truly wonderful man and he did suggest that we should have invited him on The Big Walk. Of course we didn’t say we had but his minders had told us he had a full calendar while in New Zealand.

Back at Tophouse we donned our sweaty gear again and pedalled our bikes to the Richmond Range for a thorough dowsing as the awful summer continued.

Our route took us over a high ridge into the headwaters of the Pelorus River. In the bush it became darker and darker so that at 2pm it was like night time. The thunder began to boom and lightning lit the sky so that it felt like a war zone – then cold rain pelted down. Soaked to the skin we slithered our way along an awful sidling track which eventually descended to a raging Pelorus River and after 18 long kilometres, a welcome hut. We soon had a fire going and had transformed the place into a steamy bush laundry with stuff hanging from every hook and line.

The 23^rd found us sidling down valley in better weather but the previous day had taken its toll on Jo-anne’s knees so after 7 hours we were seduced into an early stop at Captain’s Creek hut and a wash in the gorgeous river.

On the 24^th as we walked in beautiful weather, through gorgeous mixed forest, we reflected on the queer summer – climate change or not, we had heard stags roaring at Christmas, mushrooms growing in January, spring flowers in midsummer – and like most days we came to significant storm damage – mature trees, at least 40 metres high, blown to pieces by the previous days storm. To add to the mysteries of the strange climate, many beech trees literally rained wasps as we passed. We felt lucky to only suffer two stings.

Our faithful Cynth and the Australian beast were waiting at the road end to whisk us off to John Baird’s and Marg Scott’s bach on Pelorus Sound for an evening of hospitality.   

Graeme

Categories: Graeme Dingle, Jo-anne Wilkinson, South Island