The Copland Track was a warm suggestion of Irene and Pier (let’s remember, that were the two Italians we celebrated Christmas with in Sydney). After a seven hour long walk one reaches a hut which is directly next to natural hot pools. That sounded promising for us why we started our first multi-day hike. At the very beginning we got badly surprised: sand flies! When we were crossing a river these beasty things were everywhere, like clouds around us. Sand flies look like small fruit flies but they are extremely nasty and bite! The result is a bite which itches for 2 weeks. We were quite lucky that we were clothed quite warm because of the cool weather, because in contrast to mosquitos these critters are too small and are not able to stick through clothes. After we finally crossed the river and got a bit away from the water, it became better quickly and we could enjoy our walk. It went up and down through native rain forest and over rivers with funny swing bridges. A really beautiful walk!
17km and 7 hours later we finally arrived and we were positive surprised of the new built two-level hut and only wanted one thing: Relax in the hot pools! A word a blow. Slightly warmer than a bath in bathtub and an unbelievable 360° panoramic view over the snowy mountains. Just a dreamlike situation 🙂 However, we had to keep the head out of the water, because as it is a natural hot spring it’s a small paradise for a lot of bacteria which like to take a hot bath, e.g. amoebae which can cause meningitis. After a while we had to leave the pool, it became just too hot, and we went back to the hut in order to have dinner. There we got a security instruction by the ranger. We also figured out that most of the other 17 people who were in the hut were considerably older than us. The girl in the DOC in Queenstown told us that there were mainly young people, which was obviously completely wrong. But anyway…
As it was already dark and there was nothing to do, we went to bed quite early in order to enjoy the pools again in the morning and get ready for the way back. This time only 5.5 hours later, we arrived at the car and were quite happy that we did the slow way back as well and walked 34km in 2 days. As we could leave most of our valuables in the motel, we first drove there for a little coffee break and talked with our following HelpXers from Germany, but also with Mike and Heather (our hosts) and the British couple. At around 5 o’clock we said good bye and drove to our next hosts in Hokitika, two hours north. A homestay in a Christian home schooling family. As we didn’t know this concept from Germany at all, we were very curious what awaited us, but this is another story…