Hot Springs and Cold Ice: The Gang’s Last Journey (May 21-24)
- Riley Stevenson
- 4 days ago
- 9 min read
Wednesday, 6am. It’s cold and dark when I get into the car with Frank and Dukes, willingly taking the backseat so I can exist in my own cocoon for a while. We pull out of Christchurch the same way we always do, everyone mentally thinking through their packing list and gearing up for the long drive, but this time we’re quiet and sleepy and cold, cozying up to Dougie’s hardworking heaters.
The drive passes without incident, except for Dougie’s intermittent habit of her back bumper slamming into the highway if the elevation changes a mere inch or two. We drive through the landscapes that have become home, watching the sun rise over the Southern Alps, gawking at snowy Aoraki over Lake Pukaki, feeling the miles tick past through the flat and brown Mackenzie Country. It is unbelievable, this life of mine, spent rocking around in shitty old cars on the same endless stretches of pavement to go explore the most magnificent corners of this ever-surprising country.
We arrive at the trailhead a little after noon, gearing up in the damp shadow of totara trees and starting our tramp with a shin-chilling river crossing. I recognize this water, from the most incredible swim spot of my life, Blue Pools, where Tiger and I practically gave ourselves hypothermia in the clearest, most spectacularly blue water I’ve ever seen, which is just a few miles upstream.
We lace up our sneakers and are immediately confronted with a root which we need to swing ourselves up onto, portending the immense amount of scrambling to come. As we climb upwards through the totara, we reminisce on past trips and start to fantasize about home, all the things we miss and can’t wait to do again.
After a couple of hard hours of scrambling straight up, we’ve broken treeline and can see our first patch of snow, buried in the grass on the side of the trail. Frank tells us we’re ⅔ of the way there, having done this trip a month before with Dyland and Lodie, and the trail turns muddy and slick, no more roots to heave ourselves up and instead rutted-out trails to navigate and sharp grass to grab. In another half-hour we’re at the hut, gazing out at the most magnificent set of mountains I’ve seen to date. After 3km, 3,000 feet of elevation gain, and 3 hours, we’ve arrived at the first of two destinations for the trip, the place where we’ll sleep tonight.
The hut isn’t too full yet, but we still have to move people around to make room for our stuff, and as we negotiate space and stretch on the deck we make a friend, a Brit who’s lived in Queenstown since the pandemic and my favorite hut character of the semester. We watch the sunset over seemingly all of Mt. Aspiring National Park and make too much noise in the hut kitchen while we make tortellini with pesto, forever implicating ourselves as annoying Americans.
That night I turn in early in the frosty bunkroom, deleting pictures of giraffes off my camera to make room for pictures of a glacier, because my life is awesome. The hut gets cramped and the three of us end up sharing two sleeping mats, aligned head to feet. By 9pm I’m peacefully sleeping until I’m woken up by muttering and whispering all around me, raising my head to see Dukes and Frank engaged in a series of challenges including some ill-prepared guy who got turned around on his way down from the glacier and just made it to the hut and our own missing car keys back in Christchurch. “Can I go back to bed?” I ask several times before all three of them–Frank, Duke, and our British friend–shush me and I fall back asleep. In the middle of the night, I get up to pee and see the most spectacular stars yet, not getting back to sleep for a while after, buzzing with anticipation.
Thursday, 5:45am, alarms are ringing and it’s go time. We pack up as quietly and quickly as possible, leaving our sleep gear and bringing only food and layers for our dawn expedition. It’s still pitch-dark when we finally leave at 6:30, with only the stars and a bright moon lighting our path uphill.
Frank leads the way, having been here before, and we slip and slide our way up the mountain until we start heading across a huge bowl. The whole time we gaze up at Mt. Brewster as the south face lights up in the pre-dawn light, snow-covered, dazzlingly pink, hiding our destination at its feet. Behind us, the peaks of Mt. Aspiring are showing off, their white peaks reflecting gold, pink, and blue as the sun starts its ascent. I am overcome with the sight of it all, and we haven’t even made it to the glacier.
By the time sunlight grazes the top of Mt. Brewster, we’ve made it to the viewpoint. In front of us stretches the most beautiful sight I have ever seen in my life. The snowy mountain face slopes gently down onto the glacier– impossibly large, mottled white and blue, ending in frozen lakes and piles of rock debris a story high. Behind us the mountains continue their show, making the panorama truly spectacular. Best of all, we have the place to ourselves as we sit and make oatmeal, I consume the most spectacular cup of coffee of my life, and our toes start the process of freezing off our feet.
After ample gawking we descend towards the glacier itself, dropping our stuff at its foot and exploring up towards the mountain. We find ourselves in the most magically-carved ice caves, with ice smoother than glass shaped in waves and barrels like a perfectly captured ocean swell, frozen in time. We lie on our backs until our butts are red and numb, staring up at the lilac sky and the moon filling in the space between the crescents of ice. We navigate frozen streams and piles of rocks to climb further up the side of the ice, lying down as the sunshine finally breaks over the top of the mountain, warming our faces. It is the greatest morning of my life.
After a blissful six hours, including a hummus and veg lunch, time for journaling, and a slip by me into an even deeper, blue-er cave than the ones we’d explored together, it’s time to descend. I say goodbye to the glacier many times over, filled with remorse about leaving this place I’ve grown to love over these short hours. I am unsure I will ever see something quite this spectacular, and I am filled with joy and gratitude that this place exists for me to see, that I have two legs strong enough to propel me here and people with whom to share it all. Beebahboo.
On our descent, I keep falling down, sliding in the newly-defrosted mud and becoming caked in mud before we’ve made it to the treeline. Mom was right, I really don’t have any tread left in my shoes. On the way down, we discuss the reasons we go outside with a new German hut friend, the joy of silence and viewing something spectacular for a long time, observing landscapes and slowing down our outputs, like words on a page, to make way for more inputs, like the changing light on a mountain face. Steadily we descend, through the trees, saying goodbye to the panorama of Mt. Aspiring’s peaks and already thinking about our next adventure awaiting us that night.
By 5:30pm we’re back at the car, after I dip in those marvelously frigid waters, and drive West towards the coast, through the winding and beautiful roads of Mt. Aspiring National Park, my favorite national park bar none. Frank drives until we get to Haast, where we stop for a meat and potatoes dinner and thaw out in front of a wonderful wood stove, drinking tea surrounded by game trophies.
Frank is getting sick, so Dukes drives, and I try to be a good companion as I shiver in the passenger seat, thinking longingly of summer at home and food cooked by my mom. We arrive in Fox Glacier around 8pm, lightly organize our belongings, and I pass out before 9pm on my sleeping pad in the living room of our cabin. A mere half-hour later, I’m woken by the movements of Dylan and Lodie, just in from Christchurch, who inform me that Lily is not joining us for the weekend. I burst into tears, then take her bed spot and fall back asleep alongside Lodie.
Friday, 7am. I’m tired of being on the road, and I’m ready to go home, and this is the day where it really sets in. I call Tiger from the parking lot, wandering around the place where we camped once, months ago, and I complain, and I feel better.
We pack up and head out, driving out of the campground around 8. As Dylan pulls around a corner, we hear a loud thump and then, slowing down to exit the parking area, Frank shouts “your tire’s flat!”. We leave the car running, jump out, and bounce around on the campground trampoline for a few minutes, discussing our options in between bounces and giggles. Lodie does a flip, we get back in the car, and we pull into the campground parking lot to assess the damage. We decide to call AA, then Dukes, Lodie, and I go pick up breakfast and bring it back to the campground, where we colonize the picnic table in front of the office (a bold move, since according to my reservation there were two people staying in the cabin the night before). Eventually we find a jack in Dougie, then Dylan and I change the tire and we drive to a mechanic in town, who kindly repairs our tire and sends us on our way.
We’re behind schedule now and, as I know now is the group’s norm, this does not mean we’ll alter our itinerary in any way, we’ll just hike in the dark. Sigh. We reach the trailhead around noon and head out, traversing another river crossing and slogging through mud in a beautiful native forest. Every once in a while we get a spectacular view of the mountains and river, and we continue on, stopping for lunch halfway through at an un-spectacular spot on the trail because I am being stubborn.
On the second half of the hike, we traverse numerous swinging bridges reminiscent of Patagonia, and the light starts to fade around a mile from the hut. Headlamps on, we make it to camp a little after 6, stunned to see a giant two-story hut full to the brim with people. We secure our sleep mats and make a delicious taco dinner, and then it’s time for the star of the show–the hot springs.
Bathing suits on, towels in hand, we brave the cold for a short walk to numerous shallow vats of steaming water. Dylan and I investigate, and eventually we find the perfect-temperature hot spring and sink into it, careful to keep our heads above water for fear of brain-eating amoeba. Everything is perfect–the night sky is clear as day and ringed by the dark silhouettes of mountains, the water is hot, the sediment we’re sitting on is soft, and we’re the only ones there. We stay in the water, in turns standing up and sitting back down as the temperature allowed, for almost three hours, throwing our laughter skyward. The Milky Way forms and settles and we talk about space and watch shooting stars, which Dylan can never find. It is our last night in a hut together, and we are properly happy, drunk on friendship, not a note of regret or nostalgia to be found. We are truly, unabashedly delighted to be together. I sleep hard, a little soggy and squished between the people who have animated my every day of the last five months, grateful.
Saturday, 5pm. We’ve hiked out–me, Dylan, and Dukes, after a sunrise jaunt to see the sun rise over the mountains, oatmeal and a cold dip for breakfast for me, another hour in the hot springs watching the glaciated mountains from afar, then the journey back to the car while Lodie and Frank keep exploring the valley. The last half-mile we run, singing “Can’t Hold Us” and “Power” at the top of our lungs, ever the loud Americans. When we get to the car park the sun is still warm despite the November-ish chill, so we jump in the river, picking our way across the stones back to the car.
Now the sun is setting and I’m leaning my wool-covered head against the window watching colors change over the ocean. I will miss so much about this dreamy lifestyle, and the car rides are at the top of the list. I will miss endless hours revisiting the music of our youth, driving through the most spectacular landscapes known to man. I will miss our weird, exhausted dinners at random establishments throughout the country. I will miss the certain feeling of tired I get as we’re pulling into Christchurch and I remember everything I have to do before I can rest. I’ll miss how my legs feel when I get out of the car at the end of those long drives, having worked hard. I’ll miss the joy of a hot shower melting away days of trail grime and river water. I’ll miss waking up each Thursday (or sometimes Wednesday) and doing it all over again. In this moment I know I’ll miss it before it’s even gone, the pink stretching all the way across the Pacific, music in my ears, miles ahead of us and nothing to do but soak it all in.
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