Sunday 10-24-10 St. Arnaud tramp

We expected it to get cold last night but it was very comfortable.  We went to the DOC headquarters to ask how the weather was for the day (no rain but low clouds on the lake you could not see the mountain tops), we also asked about this  hike the 'St. Arnaud'.  The DOC headquarters here was very well done, they had just added some new displays and Paul and I took our time reading about the birds, and plants we might encounter on the trip.  I learned that the lake is home to the oldest eel fish (maori call them tuna) in NZ and possibly the world. These fish are really ugly and creepy  and very old, some of the females do not reach maturity till 90+ years of age, but maybe they do taste good.  There is also this bug that drills into the beech tree, the female bug houses itself in its own shell while feeding on the trees sap and then extends from the shell its anal tube and excretes this stuff called honeydew! This honeydew is very popular with birds, fungus, other native plants, and very necessary to the entire eco system. The things you learn!

With a great weather forecast for the day we set out on our hike. The forest was really cool, very different than the coastal forest.  While the coastal forest had lots silver and black fern trees, vines, and possibly dinosaurs; this forest had bushy shrubs, knotted twisted trees that look like sick Aspens, small ferns, tons of moss and lichen and three kinds of beech tree with anal tubes protruding out disguised as sweet nectar.  Our trail was very nice, there was some random creeks that sprung right from the ground and of course a few slips.  We quickly started to climb.  After about an hour on the trail it looked like we might break treelike, but we encountered some switch backs and it took a little longer to breakout and reach parachute point a rocky look out to the valley and Lake Rotoiti.  Most people stop at this point of the trail, however when you hike with Paul you can always go a bit further and a little higher. There was a trail that went to the top of the ridge from the look out, this part was very steep and had some snow. There was not a lot of snow, but it seemed to like the trail so we had to hike around it on this spongy grass. The grasshoppers did not like us walking on the grass they kept jumping all around us (I did not know grasshoppers lived this high aprox 4,000 ft, well above treelike, and Im not sure what they eat.)  

We made it to the top of the ridge, we thought there might be a saddle that we could have our lunch at, but it was just as steep on the other side.  The other side was covered with snow, and it was very windy on our narrow path on the top. My sweet Paul was grinning from ear to ear counting all of the Mt peaks, ranges and valleys he wanted to see. My grin was a bit tense, I loved our views, but don't do well so high up as I get a little vertigo. Once we got our pics and Paul had his moment to drool over the scenery we headed back to parachute rock to eat our lunch our of the wind.  I do good going up Mountains, but going down really freaks me out!  After my slow descent we made it to our lunch spot. We briefly chatted with a couple from the area, and stayed on the rocks for a good hour.  Paul spotted a glider plane that was very close the mountains we watched it for a bit, I was nervous that a wind gust might crash it into the rocky ridge, but Paul thought we should go in one. My goodness we think very differently at times! 

Once back at our campground I thought we should walk into town and find some ice cream.  At the general store I found this Magnum ice cream sandwich, it looked delicious when I heard Paul say " dude, no wwaayy! We look for these all over Mexico!" We meant our brother in law Brian. We found a table and enjoyed the ice cream and a beer. It was such a great day to have a good 5hr hike, sunshine, shower, and ice cream! We hope tomorrow is as beautiful, but we hear it might rain. Here is hoping for the best.