River Road to Greymouth

The others left first. Most thru-hikers walk their own trail at their own pace, alone with their thoughts for the hours between huts, but the rhythm of the trail gathers them together each evening under the same roof like a current depositing stones on the same stretch of bank. The five nobo hikers who had filled Kiwi Hut the night before filed out one by one at their own intervals, each setting off independently into the morning, packs shouldered, farewells exchanged with the casual brevity of people who know they will likely never see each other again but who shared a roof and a fire and the quiet solidarity of a single night in the bush. As the last of them disappeared down the track, we were just a few minutes behind, stepping out into the morning and turning our feet downstream.

This section of the trail was almost entirely on the riverbed, the track abandoning any pretence of a formed path and handing navigation over to the river itself. The braided channels of the Taramakau spread across the valley floor in a shifting maze of grey stone and shallow water, and we crossed and recrossed the river more times than either of us bothered to count. Each ford was a fresh reading of the current, a quick assessment of depth and speed and footing, boots already so permanently wet that the crossings had lost their power to dismay and become simply the way we moved through this landscape. The river was the trail, and the trail was the river, and the distinction between walking and wading had dissolved entirely.

In sections, the riverbed was obstructed by large trees swept down by previous flood waters, enormous trunks and tangled root systems deposited across the stones by forces that must have been terrifying to witness. These flood-carried giants lay where the water had abandoned them, stripped of bark and bleached grey by the sun, their size a testament to the power of a river in full rage. We navigated around them, scrambling over root balls and ducking under branches, each obstruction a reminder that the river we were casually fording today was capable of carrying entire trees like matchsticks when the rain came down hard enough from the mountains above.

At the point where the track swung south to continue its journey toward Deception Gorge, we faced the fork we had known was coming. South lay the gorge, the dramatic river passage that we had been racing the weather to reach, now closed to us by the rain that was already falling in the mountains and would only intensify over the weekend. Instead, we took the Aitken Track, a side route that led west to the highway, our exit from the backcountry and the beginning of the journey to town. One final water crossing stood between us and the track, the deepest ford of the day, the river running waist-high and fast enough to demand careful, sideways steps with poles braced against the current. We waded through with the resigned acceptance of hikers who could not possibly get any wetter than they already were, and climbed out on the far side to begin the walk to the road.

The Aitken Track delivered us to the highway, that abrupt transition from wilderness to tarmac that always feels slightly surreal, the sudden appearance of road markings and power lines and the distant sound of engines after days of hearing nothing but river and wind and birdsong. We stood on the roadside and put our thumbs out, packs at our feet, the familiar ritual of the hitch beginning again.

It was not too long before a hire van pulled over, and two female French backpackers, waved us in with the cheerful generosity of travellers who understood what it meant to be standing on a remote highway hoping for a ride. Their destination was different than ours, but they were happy to take us as far as they could. Anth folded himself into the back seat with his pack, Torrin in the front, and we headed west toward Greymouth, the van carrying us through the lush, rain-soaked landscape of the West Coast, past dense stands of podocarp and rimu forest, the Tasman Sea somewhere ahead of us beyond the hills. Almost an hour later, they dropped us at the turnoff and we thanked them with the warmth of people who know that a hitch on a quiet highway is never guaranteed and always appreciated.

We wandered across the road hoping that the next ride would not be too far away, and before we had even taken off our packs, a motorhome pulled over. Torrin said it was his shortest wait time yet, and given the number of hitches he had accumulated across the length of the North Island, that was saying something. The driver took us the rest of the way, and we were dropped off about a kilometre from the Greymouth town centre.

Greymouth. The largest town on the West Coast, sitting where the Grey River meets the Tasman Sea, a place built on gold and coal and timber and the stubborn resilience of people who choose to live on one of the wettest, wildest coastlines in the country. It is not a glamorous town, nor does it pretend to be. It wears its history in its weathered buildings and its wide, wind-scoured streets, and it offers what thru-hikers need most, food, shelter, resupply, and the simple luxury of being still for a while.

We walked the final kilometre into town and had lunch at McDonald's, that universal trail-town ritual where the menu matters less than the speed and volume at which calories can be consumed. Sitting in the plastic seats with our packs piled beside us, trail-dirty and river-soaked, eating burgers with the single-minded focus of bodies running on a deficit that polite portions could never address. While we ate, Anth booked us a few nights at the local hostel, securing a private room, that precious upgrade from dormitory bunks and shared spaces that feels like extraordinary luxury after weeks of hut living.

Over the next few days, Greymouth became our base for rest and resupply. We restocked on food for the next section, replacing what had been consumed and adjusting quantities with the improved wisdom of hikers who now understood exactly how much they ate per day and how much was dead weight. Anth recovered. His feet, his legs, his bruised backside from the Harper Pass descent, all of it was given the time and stillness it needed to repair. Torrin, in peak hiking condition after months on the trail, needed no recovery. His body had long since adapted to the daily demands of thru-hiking, the muscles and joints and cardiovascular system all operating at a level of efficiency that only sustained, unbroken weeks of walking can produce. He waited for Anth with the same patience he showed on the trail, understanding that rest days were not wasted days but the investment that made the walking days possible.

Anth booked the return to Arthur's Pass on the TranzAlpine, one of the great railway journeys of the world. The train runs between Christchurch and Greymouth, crossing the Southern Alps through the Otira Tunnel and the Waimakariri Gorge, a journey of stunning mountain scenery that draws tourists from around the globe. For us, it would serve a more practical purpose, carrying us back east across the mountains to Arthur's Pass, where the trail continued south. It was a bittersweet decision. Deception Gorge, that dramatic, dangerous river passage that had shaped our planning for days, would have to be skipped entirely. There was no let-up in the rain. The river would be running high and wild, the gorge impassable, and no amount of waiting in Greymouth was going to change what the mountains had decided. The gorge would keep its secrets from us this time.Read more