Just got back to Christchurch after spending last week walking the Rees-Dart Track in the south west of the island. It's a 4 day walk with an extra day added if you decide to climb past the Dart Glacier up to the Cascade Saddle. The first day was mostly wadding through ankle to knee deep mud along river flats thanks to recent rain. The second day was a climb (very steep) over the Rees Saddle which then descends along a creek (in Melbourne it would be called a raging river) towards the base of the Dart River and the terminal face of the glacier. I had a bit of a tumble on the way down, but luckily no one was there to see it. Got a couple of quality bruises as evidence though. The 3rd day was the longest and steepest day heading up the side of the glacier and up Cascade saddle. After reaching the top you get some of the best 360 degree views of the Glaciers and Mt Aspiring National Park and get to peer over a 1,000 meter drop along the ridge. There was snow on top of both the Rees and Cascade saddles. Both the 4th and 5th days head back down along the Dart river and were less demanding. On the last night and day it poured with rain however, and after wading my way through 2 or 3 precarious streams I hit one the was impassable. So I (and 7 others) waited for hours until it finally dropped enough to climb across a log further upstream. We ended up missing the boat to get out of the park but were lucky enough that a Ranger told us to drive his 4WD back to town from the car park. Don't know how he was getting back out, but didn't ask questions by this stage. I've got a couple of day here and then I head up to the Marlborough region to the Queen Charlotte coastal track. Unfortunately the digital camera's still in Auckland, but I've borrowed some photo's from other walkers.