Once again, what a difference a day makes.

I finished my trundle down the long D’Urville Valley which means I catch up with people. All the sudden there’s 12 of us in the Sabine Hut.

Actually it feels a few too many for me.

Early on I’d been at the D’Urville Hut, I can see it and the jetty out the window here, I first stayed there when I was 16 years old. Today I was the solitary visitor at lunchtime, but it echoed a few memories, not just that early trip, it was the start of a trip with my then partner Nicole up to Blue Lake. Water taxi both ways on the lake, a good decompression from life in the Big City. I recall there was snow from avalanches on the way up to Blue Lake so it must’ve been around October.

Otherwise there’s been plenty of mostly easy walking today. My boots were almost dry when I started, but it wasn’t long before having lost the track in a windfall I decided to cross the river and then back again. I knew that there were a few future river crossings, the D’Urville down near the lake for one, then as it happened, the deepest crossing where a bridge had been washed away, but with little flow, and last up I saved half an hour’s trudge by crossing the Sabine River below the bridge.

About that point some thunder did its thing, the rain took a while arriving but it’s really happening now as I lie in a top bunk.

I talked to some doctor, seemed to be doing well, but he hadn’t noticed that Angelus was in any way special. Man, I’ve given up on conversation after that.

I hadn’t realised how useful taking occupancy of the top bunk was.

Well, civilisation, food, and some genuinely friendly company tomorrow night.

I go outside to check my boots are out of the rain, the lake is completely calm, the standard grey mirror, but with huge raindrops dotting it. Even with the tedium of a busy hut there’s just this astonishing moment.

+++++horizontal rule+++++

A guide to the night’s accommodation: Sabine Hut

Good view, from Sabine hut, Lake Rotoroa, Nelson Lakes National Park
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