Starveall – Hacket Ridge - Organiser: Grahame Harris

We left Hacket Picnic Area shortly before 9.00am on Saturday and proceeded in our own time to Starveall Hut, arriving individually between four and five hours later. All but two members of the party dropped their packs and continued on to the top of Mt Starveall. That night four members slept in the hut and the others camped out.

Next morning we were away before 8am, climbing to the bushline on Starveall - about half the day's climbing - before dropping down to the Lowther Saddle and climbing up to the tussock slopes on the eastern side of the Hacket Peaks. The top was a viewing and photo stop, but not prolonged because of the cool southerly wind. Then down through a dip and up again to the rocky summit of Mt Gale where the same process was repeated before moving into the shelter of trees for a snack. Then it was down through Weka Pass and up on to the ridge leading to Mt Stewart. We stopped around a third of the way along on a rocky outcrop for lunch; this was the only viewpoint between Mt Gale and point 863 above Totara Saddle. After lunch we continued along the fairly level and open ridge to Mt Stewart, then out came the compass to follow a precise bearing down the featureless steep hillside to our next waypoint - a short saddle across to point 863. Near the bottom Jim's GPS told us we were about 100 metres out of line, and a correction brought us happily back on track. Another bearing took us a further 600 metres down to the track about 20 metres from Totara Saddle. From here it was a long tedious grind back to the cars. 

This day's walk took us about 9 hours, and the trip will be regraded to 4 for future reference. The most exciting incident in an otherwise straightforward trip was when Yvonne and Jocelyn sat down among a swarm of ants - yessir! - ants in the pants! The Party: Grahame Harris (organiser), Ian Pavitt (front-runner for most of the tramp), Jim Maxwell, Jocelyn Winn, Yvonne Kyle, Arthur Jonas, Kath Ballantine, Roger McMichael, & Hisa Matsuo, NMIT Adventure Tourism student.