Thread: 11 days in the Olivines

Had a cracker of an 11-day walk into the Olivine Wilderness Area over new years. Unarmed, but you'd have trouble covering that much ground and still having time to hunt anyway!

Started from the Routeburn road and walked around Lake Sylvan to the Rockburn, up the Dart to the Beansburn, up the Beansburn, over Fohn Saddle to the Olivine Ledge, down the Olivine River, up Forgotten River, over Forgotten River Col to the Olivine Ice Plateau. Climbed a couple of easy peaks there (Blockade and Little Ark) as ridiculously good weather meant the snow was too soft for any steep climbing - carried ropes etc all the way and never even used them! Then back down Forgotten River, up to the Olivine Ledge, over Fiery Col and down to Cow Saddle, down Hidden Falls Creek, over Park Pass and finally down the Rockburn and out over Sugarloaf Pass.

Got all that? Have a look on the map... New Zealand Topographic Map - NZ Topo Map

Fairly big country in there, feeling a bit fitter by the end of the trip for some reason. Anyway, here is a trucking schistload of photos for whoever wants to look at them.

Beansburn by Ben, on Flickr

Fohn Saddle by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Ledge by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River headwall by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River hotel by Ben, on Flickr

Kea by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River Col by Ben, on Flickr

Forgotten River Col by Ben, on Flickr

Blockade Ridge by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Ice Plateau by night by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Sunrise by Ben, on Flickr

Mt Aspiring by Ben, on Flickr

Little Ark and Olivine Ice Plateau by Ben, on Flickr

Little Ark by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Ice Plateau by Ben, on Flickr

Intervention Ridge by Ben, on Flickr

^^Perspective can be deceiving - the face above is about 500m away and 500m high.

Forgotten River Col by Ben, on Flickr

Intervention Ridge by Ben, on Flickr

Sunrise over Memorial Icefall by Ben, on Flickr

Blue Pool by Ben, on Flickr

Clarity by Ben, on Flickr

Blue Pool by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Ledge by Ben, on Flickr

Kea in the wind by Ben, on Flickr

Fiery Col by Ben, on Flickr

Olivine Ledge by Ben, on Flickr

^^I Like how this one shows a few of the places we went - Olivine Ledge, the clearing at the Forgotten/Olivine confluence down the valley, the snowy peak of Ark peeking over the ridge in the top right.

Fiery Col by Ben, on Flickr

Cow Saddle by Ben, on Flickr

Hidden Falls creek by Ben, on Flickr

Park Pass by Ben, on Flickr

Sugarloaf Pass by Ben, on Flickr

More photos here too for anyone who isn't sick of looking yet: https://www.flickr.com/gp/gravelben/31452P

Superb Man what an awesome trip.....anyhows did you see any furry creatures?

Originally Posted by Mathias

Superb Man what an awesome trip.....anyhows did you see any furry creatures?

Mate spotted a chamois plodding across the plateau and looking about as enthusiastic about post-holing soft snow as I was, but I was on the wrong side of the ridge at the time and missed it.

No 4-legged animals seen apart from that, but we weren't spending much time looking and didn't have binos with us. Heaps of fresh sign on the flats at the Olivine/Forgotten confluence including some pretty big stag prints.

Wow, awesome mate, some of the best, if not the best set of photos I've seen on this forum.......huge thanks for sharing. ...

Took me back to the two attempts I made on Mt Aspiring, failed both times........brill

Originally Posted by Scouser

Took me back to the two attempts I made on Mt Aspiring, failed both times........brill

I know that feeling, was planning to climb it 2 summers ago and slipped a disk a week before the trip! Its still on the list though

Great fotos mate. Awesome country. Did you see much in the way of animals at all?

Cracker, The night shot in the olivines is the titties, good job.

Truly epic trip and photos, thanks for sharing

Beautiful pictures. Epic trip alright!!

Great

Brings back a few memories from a trip we did in there about 25 years ago. Dad was doing geological mapping in the area so we flew in and stayed about a week on the Plateau, also climbed Little Ark as well as an attempt at Darkness.
Also done the 3 passes so been over Park pass and Sugarloaf so seen a bit of that part of the world.
Thanks for sharing

Awesome effort to cover that much and type of ground. Awesome pics.
I know that country well and have hunted a lot of it on foot and by machine.

I see you mentioned Helicopters flying below 500 in a wilderness area in another thread.
If on Waro they can pretty much do what they want including landings. If not on waro they are not supposed to.

Unless it was early morning or late evening I doubt they were hunting. But if they have a Waro concession they will just say they were if confronted.




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One of the other guys made a sign to show them... pilot hovered to read the sign, and there were only a couple flying past the next day

DSC_3023 by Ben, on Flickr