Mt Brown Hut - 27-28 December 2012

Uncle Roddus Tramping Diary: Tramp No 127

Mt Brown Hut - 27-28 December 2012

It has been a disappointing tramping season so far with the weather canning several trips I had planned over the last two long weekends of the year and the five day trip I should be on right now as I type, I canned due to not finding any one available to accompany me. I decided to use those days to try and get some tramping in over on the West Coast, as Alan was free and I was keen to bag some huts as I was all fired up from getting a great new book on huts for my recent Birthday. I worked out a cool trip I really wanted to do that would take four days as I had to be home for New Years Eve, but the weather forecast was for deteriorating conditions on the last two days of the trip and with part of the trip being a river trip and the rest on exposed tops, this trip really needed a prolonged fine spell to make it worthwhile. After enjoying the very cool photo of Mt Brown hut on the cover of the Book "Shelter From the Storm" that I got for my birthday(See Below), I sad to Alan I would be keen to do that for the first two days and then we could check the forecast and maybe do something else on the other two days.

The cover of "Shelter From The Storm" with the great shot of Mt Brown hut.

The old Mt Brown Hut, as marked on the above map was removed by DOC some time back and the new one(above) built on the tops by a community based group from nearby Hokitika. The story of this hut can be found Here and  it also has a a Facebook page Here . The new hut was completed near the end of 2010 and has had many many visitors since.

Alan and I left the Geologist Creek Car Park about 2PM on a warm, muggy and slightly overcast Westland afternoon, with a blanket of could siting on the tops of Mt Brown, as tends to happen in the afternoons on the West Coast. The track climbs steeply up Mt Brown through some great forest for about 1000M before we hit the hut near the eastern end of the exposed tops. We made the hut in 3 hours 15 minutes and about 10 buckets of sweat. The hut was enclosed in fog as we approached and with no wires to enjoy and no wind to shift it, we settled into this great little hut for a cuppa before dinner. 

Sunday brought us clear tops and the views we had been hoping for and after breakfast, we went for a stroll along the tops to Point 1270 for some photos and to check out the possible route along the tops to Newton biv, some 6.5KM east of out location. On returning to the hut, one of the locals from Hokitika had come up for a walk and to check the track condition and do a bit of cutting. We followed him down the old  Mt Brown Track past the old hut site and into the Styx river. Alan had helped re cut this track when they were building the hut as well as giving a hand at the hut, so he got his name on the wall and his photo in the folder.

I made the Styx Car park about 2PM and was able to get a lift back to my car from the aforementioned local while Alan was still coming out.

The forecast for the next couple of days wasn't all that promising so i decided to come home and get some gardening done instead.

Uncle Roddus About to depart Geologist Creek.

First stop for water about 1KM in .

Some Nice West Coast Bush.

Where is the Hut?

Alan inside the very neat Hut.

Da Hut Weka.

Uncle Roddus at Mt Brown Hut.

Lake Kaniere.

Went for a womble along these tops.

Da Hut.Again.

The Hut in the distance from point 1270.

The route along the tops to Newton Biv.

Led Zeppelin - Celebration Day(Live 2007)

An Uncle Roddus DVD/CD Review

December 10th 2007 at the O2 Arena London, A concert that 20 million people applied for tickets and millions more dreamed of being there. Quite possibly the most anticipated reunion concert ever and judging by this new DVD concert movie, the greatest reunion concert ever. Thank you Santa for bringing this into my life. I have watched it twice today already and am even more impressed second time through. The quality of both sound and picture is outstanding, as you'd expect and although I had read the review of the original concert and of this release, I am still surprised and extremely glad that is is as good as it is. A lot of these classic rock bands, when they record these concerts, create a sound that sounds overly polished and processed and quite soulless in this modern digital age. Zeppelin still have the passion and the chemistry playing together to create something that goes well beyond the technical sound quality of this concert to produce something magical that comes across even on the TV screen. It is why they were/still are one of the greatest bands on the planet. Robert Plant, although not quite capable of reaching the falsetto heights of his youth, never-the-less is in stunning form and has still got it to give these songs his all and Jimmy Page has lost none of his prowess on that guitar. Words fail me to describe how utterly fantastic this concert was and was probably even better in the O2 Area on the night. Many of the classics are here and sound as good as ever.

A Roddus Rating of 5/5.