Índice para April 2017 em Wilderness

MY HEART goes out to the parents of Christian Prehn, the 19-year-old German tramper who went missing in Nelson Lakes National Park in 2014. I’ve got a young daughter and the thought of her just vanishing one day makes me sick to the stomach. It’s the not knowing that would eat at me. Christian had come to New Zealand for his gap year. He was intent on spending his time in nature and to that end had planned a series of South Island tramps. But a few months into his stay, he was walking the Travers-Sabine route and was at the crux of the trip: Travers Saddle. It was here he placed his pack on the ground, presumably to find a better vantage or to climb Mt Travers, and disappeared.…

THE NEW Te Ara Pataka Track, less than an hour’s drive from Christchurch is the latest addition to an amazing portfolio of outdoor experiences near the city. Several articles in Wilderness had piqued our curiosity. Normally we prefer more difficult missions into the backcountry, but after a series of mishaps we decided we needed a sure winner. After leaving a car at the Hilltop end of the track, we began our trip from one of Te Ara Pataka’s many tributaries. We had visited the Gebbie’s Pass end of the track many times before, and chose to start from Purau Saddle instead. Since the track’s two conveniently located huts were added to DOC’s booking system, the area has become a proving ground for aspiring trampers. Unfortunately, all huts along the track…

JUDGES Alistair Hall is the editor of Wilderness. Dennis Radermacher is a professional photographer based in Christchurch. His photography has featured extensively in Wilderness and he is a past winner of the New Zealand Geographic Landscape Photographer of the Year. View his commercial and outdoor photography at www.lightforge.co.nz. VIDEO WINNER Head to our website to see the winning film in the video category. Premysl Luljak won this category last year, and he’s done it again this year with a film showing his hike to Angelus Hut in Nelson Lakes National Park. As with last year, Premysl’s film was a standout winner. It has high production values, tells a story and for those keen to tackle Robert Ridge and Speargrass Track, shows you exactly what to expect. WILDLIFE Rock wren at…

COMFORT FOOD FOR THE HILLS Kransky sausage and pumpkin risotto ULTRALITE ... ULTRACHEAP You don’t have to fork out the cash to drop excess grams from your pack FIND YOUR COMFORTABLE CARRYING CAPACITY Keep yourself safe (and get to the hut faster) with these trickss FINDING BALANCE Tips for improving your equilibrium BUYER’S GUIDE TO SOFT-SHELLS, BASE LAYERS AND FLEECE JACKETS…

FOR THOSE with dietary requirements, foods for tramping can be boring. At the end of a long day, you just want to pull out a good freeze-dried meal and eat. No fuss, just something tasty and nutritious that won’t play havoc with your gut. I have dairy-lactose and gluten allergies. After years of eating the same few freeze-dried meals, I am pretty bored. My girlfriend adheres to a FODMAP diet (avoids foods with fermentable, poorly absorbed short-chain carbs), which further limits our options. We need alternatives. I enlisted two helpers to taste-test five gluten- and dairy-free meals. The first helper randomly chose the meals, while I and the other helper blind-evaluated them. We did not know which brand or dish we were tasting. To judge taste, we considered the smell,…

Peak to Plateau Kailash 1/4 Zip L/S $160 Yak wool fabric, slim fit design, quarter-length zip, neck collar, offset seams, extended underarm gusset, long torso and back length, raglan sleeves, thumb loops, flatlock seams, machine washable. 190-245g. www.peaktoplateau.com Macpac Prothermal Zip $129.99 Polartec Power Grid polyester/ elastane construction, 50% recycled material, breathable, wicks moisture, smooth face fabric, long line with dropped hem, thumb loops, 1/4 zip with chafe-free zip flap. 180g (m); 150g (w). www.macpac.co.nz The North Face Warm L/S Zip Neck $110 Midweight zip-neck, slim fit, anti-odour treatment, polyester knit fabric with FlashDry Eco fibers to wick sweat, flat-locked seams. 250g (m); 210g (w). www.thenorthface.co.nz Macpac Nemesis Soft-shell Pants V2 $199.99 Densely woven double-weave fabric for wind resistance, breathable, DWR finish, flat waistband with adjustable webbing belt, invisible zip…

DOC’s unsung heroes AT A TIME when DOC often comes under fire for its many alleged shortcomings, an unheralded success story has to be the composting toilets installed at Manson-Nicholls Memorial Hut at Lake Daniell in Lewis Pass Scenic Reserve. Let’s give a shout out for the hardworking, and unpaid, DOC earthworms slaving away in the dark confinement at the back of the toilet block of the (French-made) Ecodomeo dry composting toilet, one of the first of its kind in New Zealand. These diligent workers are transforming faecal matter and toilet paper into compost that only needs removing every five to 15 years. Voilà – no fuss, no mess, no smell! So cheers to DOC, viva la France, and let’s have more of these brilliant toilets installed at huts around…

THE NEW ZEALAND falcon/karearea is one of only four native raptors left in New Zealand. (The others are harrier hawk, morepork and barn owl.) With an estimated 6000 to 8000 individuals, the falcon is classed as ‘nationally vulnerable’. The highest known density of karearea is found in Kaingaroa pine forest in the central North Island, though it is widely distributed on both main islands. That the birds have adapted to living in pine forest shows just how comfortable they are living in a wide variety of habitats, including from the coast to above the tree line, in podocarp and beech forests, on tussock lands and even roughly grazed hill country. The falcon can be described as largely dark brown on the back, with a streaked cream breast and a rufous,…

PLENTY OF FEATURES in the backcountry bear the name of animals. Of many examples, here are a small number: Mad Dog Hill (Kaweka Forest Park), Dead Dog Hut (Ruahine Forest Park), Cow Saddle, Cattle Ridge (Tararua Forest Park), Moa Park, Goat Bay (Abel Tasman National Park), Weka Saddle (Mt Richmond Forest Park), Kea Pass (central Southern Alps), Cat Creek (West Coast), Stag Pass, Rabbit Pass, (Mt Aspiring National Park), Blowfly Hut (South Westland), Possum Hut (Silver Peaks) and Rat Island (Rakiura). But what about features named after specific creatures? Here are four. 1 Mt Philistine, Arthur’s Pass National Park Co-founder of both the New Zealand Alpine Club and Federated Mountain Clubs, Arthur P. Harper should need no introduction to most backcountry enthusiasts. Harper climbed and explored extensively in the Southern…

Unless you plan your tramping holidays half a year in advance, it’s unlikely you’ll get a booking in any of the iconic Great Walk huts over long summer weekends. Fortunately, for those of us who prefer spontaneity, there are alternatives. When one of my dearest friends from Canada, Robyn, said she was coming to New Zealand for a visit, she suggested we try out the Greenstone-Caples loop. Robyn’s no stranger to the world of tramping. As a former Otago University Tramping Club member, she’s had her fair share of epics in the New Zealand backcountry. She tramped a section of the Greenstone- Caples with uni friends nearly 10 years ago, and wanted to tick off the whole 61km loop. Some quick research showed it was do-able in 3-4 days, making…

I’LL ADMIT to being a bit sceptical when I received Salewa’s Crow GTX ultra-light summer-mountaineering boots. Weighing in at 1220g/ pair, the Crows were not only significantly lighter than any three-four season boot I’d worn before, but were altogether more streamlined. With their petite profile and black and papavero colour scheme, they look more like a street shoe than a fully-fledged transalpine boot. But any misgivings I had were dispelled during a month of travel through the central Southern Alps over braided river valleys, steep tussock, snow, loose scree and solid rock. The full-wrap rubber rand provides good protection from sharp rocks, and the suede leather and ‘abrasion-resistant fabric’ upper held up well. After a few weeks, the latter was showing signs of fraying where river sands had abraded between…

Last Christmas Eve, we climbed The Footstool in Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park. Conditions were perfect and the splendid morning view included majestic Aoraki/Mt Cook as well as neighbouring Mt Sefton. The climb took just three hours from Sefton Bivouac – two nights here was a great bonus exchanging the madness of Christmas shopping for summer serenity in the Southern Alps.…

Be ready The key to getting a good shot of someone tramping is being ready to capture those candid moments. This means having your camera easily accessible to capture the moment without stopping. Frame the background Rather than capture a closeup of a person hiking, you should also include some of the landscape around them. That will give a sense of place and tell the story of where you are tramping. Capture some movement Great shots of people in the outdoors depends on framing and positioning. You will likely want to get ahead of the person you are photographing and capture them coming towards you. This allows you to see them in action and makes it look as if they are walking into the picture, not out of it. Add…

Just an hour and a half from Nelson, the Travers-Sabine is a beautiful, busy track. In the 2013-2014 season, about 5000 people walked it, passing from the beech-lined forest on the edge of Lake Rotoiti and up the avalanche-torn Travers Valley. Five thousand people makes for a lot of footprints. That’s why it’s so hard to figure out how German teenager Christian Prehn disappeared that summer. Prehn, 19, was on the trip of his life. He’d finished school in his hometown of Krefeld, Westphalia, and arrived in New Zealand in October 2013 with a one-year tourist visa. He already knew what he wanted to do when he got home: study to be a ship mechanic, and this gap year was a chance to have an adventure. He wanted to start…

THE MORE KIDS YOU CAN GET INTERESTED IN NATIVE FOREST AND PROTECTING FOREST, THE BETTER. In the 1960s, a small act of defiance saved what is likely the last remaining podocarp forest on the east coast of the South Island. When Ian Davies was a young forest ranger in North Otago nearly 50 years ago, he and a group of his co-workers were tasked with killing a cross section of rimu and podocarp in Herbert Forest, just south of Oamaru. They were told to cut notches in the trees, and dose them with a teaspoon of poison. “We were set up with our axes and poison, and we looked at these trees and we said, ‘we aren’t going to poison these trees and underplant them with Douglas fir – it’s…

LOWA BROADENS BOOT AND SHOE RANGE Famed for their robust three-four season tramping boots, Lowa has expanded its New Zealand line-up to include travel shoes for the first time. The brand has also released a new three-season boot. The Lowa San Francisco GTX ($359) is a warm weather casual shoe featuring an open sole construction that allows air to circulate throughout the shoe to keep them cool and dry. A Gore-Tex sole lining prevents water from gaining access. Perforated nubuck leather uppers round out the shoe. Trampers will be interested in Lowa’s Innox GTX Mid boots ($449, 920g). These are touted as being suitable for one- to multi-day tramping trips. Their lightweight construction will exclude them from alpine trips, but with a three-quarter length shank, dual density PU midsole and…