On Tuesday, I met up with Nick Pascoe and Ryan Taylor and skied in the Kaikoura Mountains.
Ryan organised for us to stay at Puhi Peaks Station, the top of the Puhi Valley Road just outside Kaikoura. The road is a dirt and gravel road that runs through dense jungle from sea level up to 550 meters.
Puhi Peaks station is a sheep farm, but appears to make the majority of it’s money from wilderness walks in summer and hunters coming to shoot goats, deer, stag and chamois.
Whilst at the station, we stayed in a small hut next to the Woolshed.
Matt, the station manager, was kind enough to drive us up to the luxury Shearwater lodge, a hunting lodge located at 1000 metres above sea level and five kilometres of 4wd track up the mountain from the farm.
The views were great. Near the summit, you could clearly see the mountains at the southern tip of the North Island and all the way south to Christchurch.
It was sunny with light winds, cool in the shade and some stronger ridge top winds. The snow was extremely variable and thin; powder, wind crust and many rocks made skiing my lightweight 83mm underfoot touring skis very difficult.
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Great effort. I’ve drooled over topos of this area, access is not straightforward and time consuming. Good to see someone getting some turns here!