From Kevin Patterson: “We took an extended Easter break to visit a part of the country we had not climbed in before. Our official aim was to climb 3 peaks in the Darrans – Talbot, Sabre, and Christina. Our real aim was to find out what it was like to climb on granite, explore the upper reaches of the Marian Valley, and maybe catch a glimpse of the hidden Lake Adelaide. PTO… Kevin Patterson After a quick flight to Invercargill we arrived in drizzle, and promptly rolled up the Marian valley to attempt Christina (2500m) via the 1980 McLeod route near the lake exit. Progress was initially rapid through light scrub. Then the terrain steepened and the bush thickened considerably such that we barely gained 20m in an hour in mist and drizzle. “I think the bush has grown a bit since McLeod bashed it” – so suitably chastened and soaked we retreated, moved up valley, and tried again the following day on another route (1955, G-H-J-M). This day was a ripper, quick progress was made until the valley walls got ridiculously steep. I eventually lead a 50m pitch with all but the first 10m unprotected, up slippery 70 degree mossy, semitussocky, rock. I had to keep going, there was nowhere to stop till the end. Visions of an 80m winger filled my mind. Ahead stretched 100’s of metres of more climbing of similar ilk until the terrain eased off. “Ahhh…I think we’ll retire to the clubhouse”. Best lunch we ever had, no wind, blue sky day (BSD), sitting on a ledge, with 400m of exposure at our feet. The next day was another BSD so we attempted to get past the Lyttle Falls at the head of the Marian Valley to have a look at Sabre as a day trip. A steep initial pitch up a grainy slab brought out the rock shoes. “Mmmm….nice Fiordland granite, solid as, can still feel that graininess through my feet. Just don’t think I can bring myself to climb anywhere else.” It didn’t last long – progress reduced to a crawl and it became obvious that even though we possibly could make it, time was against us. Again another high altitude lunch then a hasty retreat to the Gertrude Valley. Another BSD – honest, I’m not making this up. We were away to achieve Talbot (2100m) which we nailed in good time and returned to tent on the Gertrude Saddle. The next day the weather deteriorated – a wet, misty westerly with worse to come. We wandered up to Barrier and saw nothing. Sabre would have to wait. We retreated to Milford to dry out. Overnight the wind rose to 120km/h and a tremendous thunderstorm came in – best lightning I’ve ever seen – awesome. Over 150mm of rain fell. The forecast for the rest of the week was awful, snow down to 500m, 100mk/h winds till Sunday. We retreated further to Manapouri, and bagged an old favourite I’d been wanting to visit for a while – Mt Titiroa (1700m) - over a 3 day period. This mountain when viewed in summer from Manapouri looks like it has a covering of snow, but it is in fact white quartz. Access to the “Bluffs” campsite is fairly straightforward – dinghy – track – river crossing – bush bash - 7-8h from Manapuri township. Even camping as low as 900m we still collected 20-30cm of fresh snow overnight. But we were doing OK, and pushed through to the summit without much drama. Unique quartz rock shapes carved out by nature surrounded us. On our last day we did a side tour to Lake Hauroko – now this is about as far south/west you can get by road – right on the edge of the greatest wilderness still left in NZ. Sort of like how Milford Sound used to be before the tourists turned up. We did a climb to a ripper lookout and were fairly treated to a clearing sky. 400m before us was revealed the stunning blue of NZ’s deepest lake (462m, some 300m below sea level) carved out by the last ice age. In the distance the Hump Ridge, then Foveaux Strait and Stewart Island. What a trip! Additional photos/details can be viewed at http://kpatterson7.photosite.com/Fiordland/ Climbing Team – Kevin Patterson and Tom Zink Kevin Patterson
