New flies for a new country

Mouse fly, a first for me

My last couple days in the states were spent behind a vice, furiously tying the flys I could to ensure I had a fair supply and didn't leave any "must haves" out. One of these must haves was the mouse fly, a notorious big trout fly that I've never had the opportunity to try. Apparently, every 6 or seven years the south island has the right conditions to create an explosion in the mouse population. In turn, the fish turn their attention to the little furry bodies that frequently plop off the shore and swim frantically back. The fish tend to be huge and aggressive and the flies are fished actively on the surface creating some thrilling action.

The pattern itself is pretty simple, just deer hair spun around a hook; however, as John Gierach once described of bass bugs, the goal is to make the fly look as adorable as possible so that the scene of a huge trout crushing this little creature is all the more satisfying. I added some pink ears, beady black eyes, and rubber whiskers and hope to watch this little mouse get engulfed by a massive brown.

Sound to Sound

Amidst the dust and stress of packing moving out of our humble Richmond abode, I finished planning most of our trek. We are roughly planning to follow the through-hike conceived and constructed by the Te Araroa Trust but we have a few alternate paths or "tracks" as the kiwi's call them.

In general, Te Araroa south of Queenstown is a bit boring and passes through mostly farmland and has a fair amount of road walking - not my cup of tea. We aren't really invested in the idea of preserving integrity of the through hike (we are already skipping the north island) and we would rather take the time to explore other south island highlights.

Two of the main areas that the southern Te Araroa misses are the Fjordlands and Mount Aspirining National Parks. Fjordlands is notoriously the most demanding terrain to tramp in New Zealand and is also plagued by sand flies. The one track that is reasonably suited for all trampers is also one of the most popular and expensive in all of New Zealand. So I don't blame the Trust for by-passing this section in order to expand the accessibility of the track. Mount Aspiring, on the other hand, has tons of amazing tracks and breath-taking terrain not to be missed by the foot traveler and the Te Araroa passes around most of the park.

To compensate for these inadequacies, we've decided to start in Milford Sound (a large sound in the northern Fjordlands accessible by bus and boat) and head through Mount Aspiring National Park and eventually pick up the Te Araroa in Wanaka. Although we'll be getting to and from Milford Sound by bus, we'll be doing a kayak tour of the sound and the actually walking will start a short drive from the sound. The hike will eventually end on the northern coast of the South Island at Queen Charlotte Sound. Thus, sound to sound.

Milford Sound

Queen Charlotte Sound

I've taken the Te Araroa Trust's Google Earth file for the trail (shown in red) and added in some of the sections we'll be doing (shown in other colors) plus added place marks for towns we'll be stopping in and/or picking up supplies in. The start is indicated by a green place mark and the end in red.

I'm not sure what the post office situation is like there, but the TA's trail town information sheet says that the only post offices of any relevance to trampers are in Wanaka and Queenstown. This may be due to their capacity for holding large packages and mail would likely be available for pick-up in many other towns. All this to say that if you are interested and if you feel inclined, send us a letter or cookies. You will definitely receive a post card and extra kudos if you send homemade cookies across the world. Otherwise, you can just have some fun on Google Earth looking at our route. The kmz file is available for download below:

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0BxdNdQ1F0SF2Z2V0WE50N21DQUk