Glen's Training Blog #1

Glen’s Weekly XPD Training Blog

Monday 30th of November.

OK, after my wee road bike accident I’m back training, well back to the hiking training at least.
After bailing on a drive up to the Hawkes Bay on Friday night, and with most of the ACH team in Taupo screaming around the lake for the cycle challenge, paddling the lake and taking to Mountain bikes, Helen agreed to join me for a wee wander in the Aorangi Ranges south of Martinborough. A 20km drive south of Martinborough on a mix of sealed but mostly gravel road got us to the Waikuku Lodge road end and the start of the north end of the Te Kopi track.
Our aim for the day was 1) get Glen out in the open air and relieve some stress, and 2) bag Waikuku Lodge, Averills Hut and Sutherlands Hut to take my hut bagging up to 193 DOC Huts & Lodges J.

Parking at the saddle/junction of the road end, we donned packs and hats (well I did) and headed down the 4 wheel drive track into the east branch of the Turanganui River, an hour from the road end we bisected the Mt Ross track which initially heads up a side stream to the east before a slight climb onto the plateau on the east side of the stream revealed the location of Averills Hut. The Hut is in a dire state with the door unable to be closed and the rotten holes in the walls exposing weather. The 2 bunks had well eaten foam mattress and the desire to even consider a night in this hut did not exist. If your a Hut bagger like myself, I’d consider knocking this one off your list sooner rather than later as I’m sure DOC will be knocking it down shortly.

The fun part of access into Averills and the Mt Ross track is the initial river travel (only about 400 odd meters) which includes an amount of Onga Onga bashing, Helen & I managed to clear some of it, but the crops that exist suggest that this will return quickly.

Back down stream to the 4 wheel drive Te Kopi track and we were again wander along very easy travel with about 5-6 river crossings and after about 20-30 minutes wandering into the Sutherlands Hut which is located in a big grassing clearing. A couple of trail bikers from Wellington had ridden in that day and were setting themselves up for the night (even though it was only 2pm). After a 30 minute break for Ham, Cheese and Tomato rolls, o and a Mac’s Radler beer, we continued downstream before taking in the 370 meter climb up the Pig Spur track. What was interesting at his stage was the 4 wheel track had by this stage shrunk down to a quad bike wide track as it climbed the spur to the high point 588. The perfect blue skies were slowly being absorbed by an ever thickening layer of cloud over Mt Ross just as we hit the top of our climb where we rewarded ourselves with a BIG can of V.

After our climb, we dropped about 30 meters into a saddle before the last little climb onto the Turanganui West Branch and Mill track junction, signalling our last 40 minute dash initially through some native bush then into low scrub track with views down to the south at the 4 wheel track we had started our day on and the junction and car below. All up a leisurely 5 hour wander, which we finished off with a visit to the Waikuku Lodge (bookings required).

Gear Used:
Bridgedale Multisport Socks (1 wet sock, 1 dry sock).. feet, PERFECT
Solamon XT Wings
Ice Breaker Bodyfit 160 T-shirt
No brand walk shorts
A map & My old Fairydown BackTap day pack with 4kg of gear

Food consumed:
2 Ham, Cheese and Tomato Cheesy Bacon rolls
1 litre of Poweraide
A hand full of Dark Chocolate coated Strawberry flavoured Liquorice and some Cashews.
1 Bottle of Mac’s Radler Bier (each)

Weather:
Fine clear skies, 24 degrees, light nor-wester turning to the south by end of day.

Welcome to the Aotearoa Crocodile Hunters Blog

In the words of the legendary King’s Cross Bogun CHK CHK BOOM – it’s all go for XPD 2010.

Aotearoa Crocodile Hunters are a Wellington, New Zealand based team of four ordinary people doing an extraordinary event. None of us are elite athletes. All of us work for a living. Three of us have children and families. All of us should have grown out of this by now.

But we haven’t. And we won’t.

Check back here for updates on how our training is going.