Double Hut, shortly after 8 in the morning. When I got the hut last night there were 3 other guys in the hut, they had the fire going and some nice music too. I was totally exhausted and wasn’t sure if I could continue walking for another 2 days, with my heels so damaged and painful. I asked the guys where they were going and they were going back to the nearest car park (10 km, 3 hours away), I asked them if they were willing to give me a lift in their car to where my car was parked. That was no problem. But, they would get up early and so I had to get up early too

The others have about a 15 minute head start on me but agreed to wait for me at the carpark which is in the far distance to the left of Lake Heron. It’s still cold, especially without the sun

Damn, yet another river crossing, so once again boots off, water shoes on, boots tied together around my neck, cross the river, take off the water shoes, get my towel out, dry my feet, put on my boots again and put the towel and shoes away

At least the sun makes an appearance now!

Today’s track out of here is pretty much 3 hours of this. Disappointing I had to give up 1 day early but hey, I’ll do that part another time

Getting close to the lake, it was another 45 minutes from here to the carpark where I got my ride to my car and drove back to Christchurch

Today’s track, my GPS says it was 9 km and that it took me 2 hours and 45 minutes