Day 27: Cass Saddle to Hamilton Hut

19km, 7 hours

This is more of a placeholder blog because I was having too much fun/relaxed this evening to write my diary.

It was a pretty short day hiking to Hamilton Hut with David, Conny, Iván and Laura - as short as hiking 19km is. We got there at 3pm which was so early but we decided to stay rather than walk on another 20km to a camp site. Hamilton Hut has a reputation of being one of the nicest huts on trail. I was expecting good views but it was tucked in the bush overlooking a near dry river however the inside of the hut and it's fire place was very quaint. What i didn't like was the near full drop toilet with a sign from DOC saying if it's getting too full there is a stick and a rake under the hut that can be used to stir the contents of the drop toilet so it breaks down more. No thank you!! I will not be touching that stick.

There was a sign to a tarn called Mirror Tarn so i thought I'd climb up there to have a look. Such a sucker for punishment making my self climb more mountains but the allure of a good view was too strong and i thought maybe i could swim in the tarn. It was a mirror but I certainly wasn't swimming in it. I came back down and sat in the shallow river instead to clean off. I was feeling so tired today! Maybe it was all the food I ate in Arthur's Pass or the fact that we resupplied so our packs are back at their heaviest. Today just seemed hard. It also seemed like a Midnight Oil playlist day so i could just hum along as i went without it being high energy tunes.

From 4pm onwards we pulled our hut mattresses out onto the deck and laid in the sun and chatted and laughed all afternoon before cooking dinner individually but together that evening. We stayed there till 9pm when we just couldn't take the sandflies anymore!

It felt like a day off even though we still walked 19km.

Ren x