20 km off the sh main road to the road end and car park, 13km of it is gravel but no 4 wheel drive required. 1hour walk into Lake Matiri Hut, a cosy 6 bunk hut with a fireplace and a great view of the lake. A good option for an overnight at either end of hike. Next morning we had a 750 m climb up through the steep and muddy bush to the wide and tussock covered 1000 acre plateau and a poled route to Poor Pete’s 2 bed bunker with a decent porch and good camping options and a chance to refill water bottles. Next is the walk to the Larrikin Creek Hut which sits on the forest edge. It is also a poled route from Poor Petes, through the forest briefly until you pop out onto the open plateau. It is a solid 3 hour hike to the hut across the plateau with its streams and tarns and undulating landscape with the haystack in the foreground the whole way. Arriving at the hut at 3pm, rather wet from the steady but light rain that had set in. We were very lucky to have this cute 4 bunk hut to ourselves, so Rob got the fire roaring [with the help of fire starters] and the woodshed was well stocked?
Next morning through the muddy and root laden track to a mid level plateau,. there is no route so pick you own, we decided to do a bit of rock scrambling up a gully to the 100 acre plateau or Devils Dining Table, scattered with tarns and sink holes. Rita leant some new techy moves climbing vertical rock with holds! After having lunch by one of the many tarns up there and taking in the views and cliffs we found a route around the side of the Needle. After a steady short climb, negotiating more rocks and boulders and hauling ourselves up we reached the summit 1438M and enjoyed 360 degree views today, as far as Mt Patriarch. Haystack next, so down, up and along the nail-biting ridge which was narrow in places and had exposure .
It was overgrown making it a tiring bush bash to get off one ridge and onto the next one! Luckily we found some cairns further along the ridge enroute to the Haystack which would be our escape route back down to the hut later. We enjoyed a leisurely amble/boulder hoping hike along the ’Weetbix layers of limestone ‘ to arrive onto the summit, admiring the views and enjoying the warmth and sunshine of the late afternoon, blessed also with no wind to the highest point, at 1525M.We had a fun time navigating our way down the spurs and gullies to the hut arriving back in the sunshine at 7.00 pm, a 9 hour day roughly. Next morning we decided to visit the ‘swimming holes so many had written about in the logbook. An hour return trip, it was well worth the effort following the creek in front of the hut and we wished we had gone the night before to have a dip and watch the sunset over the precipitous drop, some 300M below. The Larrikin Creek is a tributary of the Mokihinui River. There are 4 decent swimming holes ending before the "drop off " at the end and a superb view of the route back across the 1000acre plateau we would take today to Lake Matiri and our car. And so we set off for home at 10am from the hut, arriving at the car at 6.30 pm, after a good break on the porch of Poor Petes hut. Thank you to Astrid, (leader) and Rob for their navigation, Christine (scribe), and Rita. A good team of 4, home in Nelson by 9pm.
