Our daughter wanted to go to the west coast for professional reasons (to photograph mosses for a project she’s doing), so my husband and I happily agreed to accompany her for a weekend getaway.

We left Friday evening, stopping at Lake Pearson (Moana Rua) for a lovely picnic dinner, and then carrying on over the mountains to camp at Goldsborough Campsite near Kumara. We pulled into the campsite around eight o’clock and set up camp. With the light already fading, we decided to wander up one of the tracks that followed old gold mining tracks through the bush. 

We started up German Gully Track, thinking we’d just go up a little ways, then return. The track passed an old mining water race that looked like a cathedral-shaped tunnel as it snaked steadily up the hill. Soon we were close enough to the end of the track that, of course, we had to finish. 

We popped out onto a broad, modern gold mining road. The sign at the road indicated that we could either return to the track the way we came (30 minutes, according to the sign), or return via Goff’s Track (65 minutes). It was 8.55 pm. To take Goff’s Track would, theoretically, have us arriving back at the campsite at 10 pm. After ascertaining we all had our head torches with us, we powered up the road towards Goff’s Track.

The west coast was unusually dry, for which I was glad as we picked our way down Goff’s Track in the gloom—while most of the track was easy going, the steeper sections would have been slick and no fun in low light.

Knowing we were racing the light, we kept the pace up, and didn’t even need to use our torches, arriving back at the campsite around 9.30. A nice little evening hike!

The following day, we got an early start and hiked up Mount French, near Lake Brunner. None of the track descriptions have much to say, except that the hike is a steady climb of over 1000 vertical metres. Telling, however, are the listed track length and times: 7 km return, 8 hours return. That’s a walking speed of only 875 metres per hour. 

We did slightly better, making the 3.5 kilometre trip to the summit in 3 hours forty-five minutes, for a walking speed of 933 metres per hour. Most of the hike up is through dense west coast rainforest, so other than the forest itself, there’s not much to see. When we hit the alpine vegetation near the top, the views opened up and it was spectacular. At first we were a little worried we’d struggle to find our way across the multiple false peaks to the actual summit, because clouds obscured the tops. In hindsight, I’m glad the cloud was there, because when it did clear and we finally got a view of the summit, I was disappointed at how far away it still was. LOL! Though the elevational change from the bottom to the top is officially a bit over 1000 metres, there are several significant dips along the ridge, so I suspect the actual amount of climbing you do to reach the summit is more like 1200 metres.

But we made it, and by the time we were on the summit the clouds had cleared entirely. We had stunning views to the Tasman Sea on one side, and to the mountains on the other. Lake Brunner glittered in the sun far below us. 

We had lunch on the peak and spent a good bit of time enjoying the view and exploring the plants and insects at the top before tackling the descent.

Going down was faster than going up, and we reached the car shortly after 3 pm, hot and sweaty and ready for a swim. After a quick dip in Lake Brunner, and a change of clothes, we headed to Hokitika for dinner and a short stroll on the beach.

All of us were in bed and asleep early Saturday night.

Sunday, we packed up camp and headed to Lake Kaniere to hike the Lake Kaniere walkway. We’ve done part of this walk several times. It’s a mostly flat, well maintained track that follows the entire western edge of the lake. There are multiple stony beaches to stop at along the way, and amazing lowland rainforest vegetation. 

On Sunday, it was also really hot (28 degrees by early afternoon). And even on the flat, we were sweating. My husband turned back about a third of the way into the hike, in order to drive the car to the end of the one-way track. My daughter and I continued on, stopping for a quick skinny dip at Lawyer’s Delight beach, before meeting my husband walking back towards us from the far end, about a kilometre from the end of the track.

We had lunch, a stop a Dorothy Falls, and another swim in Lake Kaniere, then headed home.

The entire weekend on the west coast was hot and sunny, so it was a bit of a shock to hit Porter’s Pass and drive into drizzle and 12 degrees. It was a chilly 15 at home under overcast skies. Poor Canterbury—this summer has been anything but summery here. It’s no wonder the west coast was absolutely packed with vacationing families.

And now I have one week left before returning to the day job. My summer to-do list is getting shorter, but I will definitely not accomplish everything on it. But it’s been a good summer for getting out and hiking, so I can’t complain. Now I just need to knuckle down and get some writing in while I can.