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Written by GregBrave
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Saturday, 11 October 2008 15:58 |
In this article I want to talk about tramping in New Zealand. Tramping is what Kiwis (New Zealanders) call hiking or trekking. What is it like to tramp in NZ? Well, before my first real tramp there I could only guess what its like.
I thought that it would be really nice to see the breathtaking nature from close, and that it would be great to spend a night in the warm hut talking with different people from all over the world. I also thought that it would be nice to ford rivers and go up the mountains to see snow in the summer. Long time past since my first tramp, and since then, while walking many of New Zealand’s tramps I learned, or at least I think so, what a real tramp is. Of course you see the beautiful Nature, and you meet people on the tramp, but in addition there is much more to a tramp. First of all there is a lot of walking involved. And if you doing a multi-day tramp (and I will be referring in this post mostly to those) you have to walk with a relatively heavy backpack. I should say here right away that when I am talking about tramping, I mean the real tramping when you take all your stuff with you, and nobody is carrying it for you from hut to hut (which is an option on several tramps). Having backpack on you makes it much more difficult to go up the hills or through tree roots in the forest, and it may result in sore legs, and many other muscles in the evening. Take this into consideration when packing your backpack and make it as light as possible. I will talk about packing a backpack in my next posts. One more thing is that when you go, for example, on a three-day tramp there is a fair chance that at least one of those days will be rainy. And when you walk several hours in the rain, everything gets wet, so you should be mentally prepared for it. There is no other way to prepare for rain. Well, there is one important thing that you absolutely must do – make sure that all your stuff in the backpack is 100% water protected. One way of doing it is to use pack liner. But still even if your stuff will remain dry, most chances are that you will get wet, and walking in wet clothing is something that you have to get used to…
Lets continue. Getting wet while trekking. If you are mentally prepared for it, it is much better. Most chances are that you will be able to dry yourself, at least partially, when you arrive to your next hut (provided that you are tramping from hut to hut and don’t use a tent).
Next factor I would like to talk about is the terrain. Terrain can differ greatly on the same tramp, and it has to be taken into a consideration when planning your route. If, for example, you see in the tramp description that you will have to climb up the hill for 500 meters, then you should know that this section will take you much more time than it would have if you walked on the flat surface. One more example for difficult terrain is heavy bush - if your trek goes through heavy bush, all your day’s distance may sum up to only 8 kilometers! Before starting any multi day trek you should go to the DOC visitor center of the area and talk to rangers there. Ask them about the track current condition and the estimated walking times. To be totally fair I should say that from my experience with DOC rangers they tend to exaggerate the difficulty of the trek. But this is also understandable because many different people with various levels of fitness come to ask for advice and DOC rangers have to be on the safe side. Only from your own experience from other treks (in New Zealand), together with DOC advice you will be able to estimate correctly the real difficulty of the trek. This is why if you just beginning your tramping in New Zealand, even if you are an experienced trekker from other parts of the world, you should start with short and easy tramps so that you will gather the necessary experience for more difficult and more interesting tramps. |
