High Country Rock Wrestling
With tidy looking weather on the cards, another route was prepared to head up to the High Country for an overnighter. While the majority of the route was familiar territory, there was a plotted route to explore a couple of valleys I had previously ridden past, but hadn't yet ventured up.
The riding crew consisted of the KTM trio Ian, Mark and me. To get a jump on things for the maximum riding time on the Saturday, we shot up to the cuff of the High Country on Friday afternoon and camped up the night.
Our route up to the High Country was made up of as many gravel roads as possible and included a few side tracks. Here we are heading out to the confluence of the Kowai River and Waimakariri River to set a new AdventureToken - viewable on the AdventureToken map
After fueling up at the last petrol station we made our way up to a camp spot on the shore of a lake
Waking to a picture perfect blue sky day the next morning, we eagerly packed up camp and hit the trails
The mercury was reading in the low single digits however it made for a perfect riding temperature as we started the route up into the High Country
As we progressed up the valley, we reached a point where the 4X4 tracks fade away and the rock wrestling begins
After a couple of decent river crossings we made our way up to the hut we planned to use as a base
With plenty of daylight left, we dropped our gear and shot off to have a look up one of the nearby valleys
While there was a lot of rock wrestling and some challenging line picking to cross some of the rivers, we successfully made it to the planned destination and had some pretty impressive views
When daylight started to run thin we made our way back to the hut. We used the bikes to collect some firewood and settled around a warm fire for the evening
Later that night I pulled out the tripod and played around getting some cool night shots. I was on the camera, Mark was working the fire and Ian did some light painting. The combined efforts produced this photo :)
While the hut was appealing in a rustic manner, the number of holes allowing strong draughts to whistle through meant we could almost fly a kite inside the hut! Combined with below zero degree temperatures, it was far from tropical :) All the bikes had a decent layer of frost on them come morning.
While it was all blue skies the day before, this day brought a decent covering of cloud. With all the rock wrestling lined up for the day, it wasn't a bad thing. It stayed at a perfect temperature for this type of riding. View of Cabot Ridge Waterfall
Breaking through the ice
As we headed further up towards Unknown Valley we were presented with some fairly challenging river crossings
Finally we reached our destination of Unknown Flats, a large grassy bench near the valley headwaters. We stopped here for a bit of a rest and a bite to eat
After heading back out of that valley, we were off to have a look up Weka Stream and the nearby hut before heading out of the High Country and back home
We managed to find the elusive hut located in a thick section of bush. An awesome little spot
Weka Stream Valley
The final views down the valley as we made our way back to the gravel roads and then back onto the tarmac to rejoin society!
This was yet another great High Country trip. If you are interested in riding these routes you can find all the route information here: Wilberforce Explorer.