Start – Lower Princhester Hut
Finish – Aparima Hut
Daily Distance – 16 km
TA Distance – 2829 km
Bluff Distance – 212 km
A comment in tonight’s hut book summed up the day perfectly. “Tussocks make you appreciate the
forest”. Well today had plenty of tussocks, or more accurately a new terrain type which has been
designated, “bossocks”. It is a particularly cunning combination of chest high grass, obscuring a bog
placed precisely where your foot is about to land. “Bossocks” is therefore both an accurate description of
this bog/tussock land and a frequently heard expletive when someone’s foot disappears to mid-shin.
The remainder of today’s walking has been through beech forest, which was an unexpected pleasure.
Slow going at 1.5-2.5 kph (usual walking pace being 4-5 kph), but a welcome respite. Because of all these
challenges the 16km took an exhausting 7 hours, a full hour longer than the longest estimate in the trail
notes. There is actually considerable disagreement in timings over this section. The trail notes state that
today should have taken 5-6 hours, whereas the signposts said 8 hours. Based on these timings my day
tomorrow will either take 10 or 15 hours, so a bit of a difference.
