Soggy Stag

Herein lies the delayed re-telling of an early winter tramp to Roaring Stag Hut. As with many tramps over the years, the intented destination was originally not Roaring Stag, but come Sunday 31st of May that's exactly where we were heading.

The wet weather had not put off others heading out for a long weekend, post Covid-19 lockdown tramp either, and he roadend carpark was full when we arrived early Sunday afternoon.
I've recounted the details of this track many times, so I will refrain from doing so again, except to add that the weather was not as bad as anticipated, even if the showers near-constant.

By the time we had descended off the ridge for the final strecth to the hut, the darkness was setting in and we made the remainder of the journey by the light of headlamps. Within a kilometre from the hut we encountered a hunter heading the other way, who we later found out was bound for the roadend from Cow Creek Hut.
Soon enough we arrived at to find the fire going and the hut nice and warm, courtesy of the six other trampers already in residence.

Night time track

Night time hut

The weather had taken a turn for the worst by the next day, the showers of Sunday developing into that kind of persistent Tararua rain that doesn't seem that heavy but manages to be somehow a lot wetter than you'd think.

As we were leaving the hut, we encountered a pair of saturated trampers coming from Cow Creek Hut. It was them who told us about the hunter we'd come across the night before - whilst they had stopped at Cow Creek for the night, the hunter had continued on from Dundas (I think), all the way to the roadend.

Aside from the rain, mud was the other constant on the track, with the fun little twist that muddy bits of track were so waterlogged that the puddles on top of the mud rinsed the mud off our boots.

The rain slowly soaking us made for a decent motivator, and we were back at the roadend just and 3.5 hours arfter leaving the hut, with minimal slipping on wet ground along the way. Saturated but satisfied after finally getting out in the hills after a long hiatus.