We wanted to walk up Mt Arthur in Kahurangi National Park, which supposedly looks a little bit like Mt Owen (which we walked up in November 2011). The weather forecast suggested the clouds might clear off the top of Mt Arthur by the middle of the afternoon, so initially we headed along the valley and checked out the rock shelters. They have built bunks and a hut up under the rock shelters at Gridiron Gulch.
The Gridiron Gulch rock shelter
After lunch we headed up towards Mt Arthur Hut. We soon found ourselves walking in the clouds and it was hard to see the next trail marker at times. The forest up high was very different, with lots of mountain cabbage trees. We came across a woman tracking the 12 kiwi that were released in the area a couple of years ago. She told us that one of them had just had a chick. We also came across one of the endemic carnivorous snails.
Carnivorous snail (about 10 cm long)
Forest in the cloud
Mountain cabbage tree
We got to the hut and decided there was no point in going up to the top as you wouldn't have been able to see anything. We'll have to come back and try again another time.
Mt Arthur Hut
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