Cow Creek Hut 25-26/06/2011

Got delayed by work, flaky Solaris things (nothing beats Mac OS X) so decided on leaving Saturday morning. Made the mistake of popping into work to check on things and got side tracked by wireshark and its ability to decrypt HTTPS when you have server keys. Good fun stuff.
Saturday 25/06/2011
So got to Kiriwhakapapa road end much later than expected and headed off at 1547. Got to the Blue Range turnoff at 1655 and decided to check the hut out and if it was empty to stay there the night. Feeling lazy. Some good views along the ridge.

But Blue Range hut was full so on to Cow Creek in the darkening of the night. No lurking vampires in the trees. Kinda like the older signage dosnt seem so oshy.

Got there at 1911 and its been cleared around the hut with a huge pile of wood. No problems getting a good fire going. A great nights sleep with Tararua rain music.
Sunday 26/06/2011
Set the alarm for midday as no need to rush out in the morning, had decided I wasnt going anywhere.

Had a sweep out and stacked some wood before leaving.
1318 Left Cow Creek hut.
1418 At Waingawa sign, a perfect 1 hour.
1507 At Blue Range hut turnoff sign.
1547 At Kiriwhakapapa Road end.
Its much faster coming out than going in, that was 3 hours 5 minutes from Kiriwhakapapa Road end to Cow Creek hut; and 2 hours 29 minutes from Cow Creek hut to Kiriwhakapapa Road end. A good nights sleep gives good energy.