The inside of the hut, on the table is where I had the now missing ziploc bag, the hut has chicken wire all around the inside yet no trace of the bag. Anyway, my backpack is all packed and ready to go. I myself am not, as my heels are still killing me but I must as my car is parked 2 days walking away from here, I just have to keep moving

The other side of the hut. In hindsight that metal lockable cabinet should have been enough warning to me to stash edibles in there and not leave them on the table

The orange DOC track markers here are awful, DOC has once again made a mess from it. I follow this path away from the hut, clearly the path to follow and then suddenly there are no more orange markers, it took me 15 minutes to find the next marker which was hidden somewhere to the left of me, on a hill, great start of the day

And then when I follow the markers within a few minutes they lead me here. A river. Damn! Because of the recent rainfall the river is too high to walk to the side of it, though that is what the map seemed to suggest. I will have to walk through the river. *sigh*

What followed was hours and hours of walking through rather fast flowing rivers, that’s hours and hours of wearing my ‘water shoes’ (the ones in the 3rd and 4th foto here), which don’t give me much support, are cold and the water is biting the wounds on my heels

Endless river crossings, constantly switching between the left and right bank of the river

After what feels like a hundred river crossings I come to a bit where the track veers away a bit from the river, keeping my feet drier but still uncomfortable, I can’t wait to put by boots on again for more support and warmth, but I will only do that once there is no more river to cross

The track is now going up more and more

The river is still here but is smaller, though I’m still not able to hop across it

Great scenery!

I keep hoping that around the corner there is a gently downhill track but every time there is a new hill to climb

So that’s the direction I came from, quite the climb already

But it just keeps going up and up and up

And this is what it did do my heels, yes, both heels. I’ve blurred the photo a bit but you can imagine what it’s like walking in that, uphill, with 20 kg on your back, through cold rivers. Right now I am thinking about when I finally make it to my car and can have some diet coke that I left in there and something to snack! That moment is only 2 days away now. The good news is that I can now finally put my boots on again, the river is now well behind me

Despite the pain, I am definitely enjoying the views and by looking at the clouds I think some glider pilots must be having a good time in wave as well

Clear indication of wave

I have now made it to the Clent Hills Saddle, one more look back before finally descending towards Double Hut

The descend, what a view! It would take me another 3 hours to actually make it to the hut, totally exhausted

Today’s track, the total ascend was 600 meters, total length was about 19 km and it took me 9 whopping hours. On their website DOC says 6 hours and on the sign next to Comyns Hut it said 7 hours!

The Rakaia River and some of the mountains I fly most of the times behind me. I’m glad I do the track SOBO (southbound) because for good photos you should always have the sun in the back of course (unlike in this picture)

Rachel walked up a bit with me (pink figure in distance in first photo) and took this photo of me, I was still happy here (what do I mean by that? keep reading!)

About 20 minutes later, another look back north

The cloud is slowly disappearing, good, makes for nicer photos, lovely terrain here!

I mean, this looks great! I can see why this is part of the Te Araroa

There is a lot of going up though, tough going at times with my 20 kg backpack, Turtons Saddle coming up

Looking back, again, I’ve climbed quite a bit already, in the far distance the Birdwood Range

The track continues to the end of this valley

This is about halfway along today’s track: the A Frame Hut (and toilet), Black Hill Range in the distance

I wonder why they call it A Frame Hut

Well, that explains it

Interesting rock (stone? limestone?) formations

The sun has been gone for a while now, my heels have developed not so much blisters but coin-size patches where the skin has been rubbed off, I should have broken in my shoes first! It’s rather painful. Luckily I see Comyns Hut in the distance! I can’t wait to get there and take of my boots

Damn! Before I get to the hut there is a river to cross and because of the heavy rain of the past few days it’s rather high, meaning I can’t just hop some stones to get across. I hate crossing rivers with my boots as they’ll stay wet and cold for too long. Luckily I brought some ‘water boots’: neopreen with a Vibram-like sole, unfortunately the cold water really bites my damaged heels, not a nice ending of the day

Half an hour later, finally at the actual hut, the smile is just for the photo, my heels feel awful and the hut doesn’t have a saw meaning despite there being a fireplace and some beach branches outside, I can’t light a fire, bummer!

A map of today’s hike, it was 16 km and took me 5 hours