The eve of our Routeburn trek was spent undertaking the usual administration duties, as we like to call them. Even more so for Shaun now, as he's set up a business with a friend of his back in the UK. As he worked, I 'faffed', as Shaun calls it - although it's this obligatory planning and sorting that made these type of things happen for us in the first place! I guess we have a silent understanding of how we work separately and together, which has been finely tuned along the way.

So, all prepared, we got our heads down earlier than usual as we had to be up for 5am in order to get the first of two buses to the start of the track.

Getting up that early wasn't pleasant, especially as there was a frosty chill in the air, but the excitement and slight nerves got us up and going in no time. We had loaded our backpacks with only the necessary clothes, gear and food rations for the three days, along with the sleeping bags and a cooking pot that we'd hired from a local business. The weather could be quite unpredictable and subject to rapid change, so we were hopeful that we'd packed well enough to see us through unscathed.

Although the route itself is only 32km, the road distance between the start and end points is around 350km, therefore meaning that we had to consider where to park our van for the duration. We decided on finishing at the point that was closer to Te Anau (around 80km away), so we dropped our van off at a secure car park in the town and took the two buses to the other end at Glenorchy. We switched in Queenstown and as there had two hours until the connecting service arrived, we took the opportunity to have a little mooch around the city.

It seemed pretty nice, if not a touch 'too cool for school' - which is to be expected, given the amount of extreme activities on offer, from bungee jumps to hang-gliding to paragliding and everything in-between. As it goes, hiking is probably as extreme as it gets for me.

On the drive up to the start point, we got chatting to some fellow 'trampers' called Steve and Matt, a father/son team of from Auckland and the shuttle bus stopped a couple of times to allow us to take in the spectacular views.

As we got closer, we were both raring to get going, even if the first day's hike was to only be a short one. It was just over 3 hours in total, with the first two hours or so consisting of well-formed tracks through forest terrain, coupled with a number of swing-bridges across turquoise rivers. We made two stops as we took it all in: The first was a short break in the centre of the valley 'flats' - the 360 degree views of the mountains around us presented a photo opportunity that wasn't to be missed; the second happened when an intrepid bird flew by and after saying hello, he pecked away at Shaun's shoes, presumably thinking that the logo was a grub of some sort. We happily snapped away as he danced about in front of us both.

The last hour presented the trickiest obstacles - a sharp ascent followed by narrow ridges to our first night's accommodation at the Routeburn Falls Hut. It wasn't too gruelling, however, and we arrived to what was an already full shelter.

The hut itself was surprisingly well kept: There were decent bunk beds in large dorm style rooms; a warm kitchen/common room; even clean, flushing toilets. After selecting our beds opposite two lovely sisters from Sydney called Renee and Danielle, we constructed our rather questionable dinner consisting of Pasta 'n' Sauce with tuna. A fellow walker donated some peas to further bulk it up, but it still left a lot to be desired.

There were quite a diverse mix of nationalities sharing the fully booked hut that night, but as it goes, the ranger (who looks after the huts and the surrounding area) chose me, being from Finland, as the most exotic guest of the night. I think this should have made front page news in the Finnish tabloids; I made our little Finland stand out, if only for one night.

After a few games of dominoes with a chap called Tom - an American who had been living in Wellington for the past few years but was due to go home soon - we called it a night, with me dreading the possibility of snorers. As it goes, the Aussie sisters were as silent as anything and to my relief, the rest of the 20 sleepers in our room stayed relatively quiet as well.

Click here to read Part 3