Day 19: Hooker Valley Trail
Saturday, September 14th
Another day where we are up and at em’. We both shower and hit the road. We head straight to Tekapo. We stopped to see the Church of the Good Shepherd, which was built first and foremost for the glory of God and secondly as a memorial of the pioneers. It was a beautiful little church. There is also a Sheepdog memorial, which is in appreciation of the collie dog, which helped with the grazing of the mountain country.
We continue on our drive around Lake Pukaki, and WOW. I have never seen this shade of blue in the water before. It was stunning. Just as we arrive to Hooker Valley Trail, the weather clears. God always has our back.
We arrive at where we think we are supposed to be. There are cars and camper vans parked everywhere in the road. The parking lot was full. So we just follow suit and park along the road. As we are walking up, we then see a woman opening the gate of a road that was closed where everyone was walking. We then realize that’s the road that takes you to the actual trail head. She informed us a snow plow was coming to clear the way, and the road would be open in about 15 minutes. We go and grab the van, and after 15 minutes, she tells us it’s going to be another 30. We decided to move the van to a better spot, completely off the road, and venture a mile down towards the trail head. We see a DOC (Department of conservation) truck driving out. Christopher jokes and says we should hitch a ride back (we wanted to take some layers off, because it was warmer than expected despite the snow), so I immediately yell out and ask. The two men clear the back of the truck, and we hop in. Turns out, they are both two Americans from Montana. They dropped us at our camper van and then we moved it to the actual trail head.
Funny side story… Christopher once again tries to tell me how to open and close the van door after he painfully watches me struggle. I hurry him along and tell him “We don’t need a display” (on the right way to do it) LOL we were dying laughing, per usual, and NOW the hike begins.
There are no words for the beauty of these mountains. We ended up doing the entire Hooker Valley Trail. There were 3 very cool bridges we got to walk over, and we made it all the way to the lake at the end. The best photos we got were actually on the return. I’ll be honest, the final “viewpoint” was quite underwhelming. Some of the best views were amidst the middle of the hike. We met another cool couple from Brasil who now lives in Australia and exchanged photos and then instagrams. Once again, another great encounter.
We then meet a super cute family with two little girls from Brisbane and Christopher got some great family photos for them. It was the kids first time ever seeing snow, and the daughter insisted that her mom tell us that it was her birthday. It was adorable.
Christopher’s Lululemon city shoes and my Dr. Scholl white shoes both were the best move of the day. We didn’t even wear our regular tennis shoes, because with the melting snow, we wanted something with more rubber and leather to keep our feet dry. It was a slippery hike with all the snow, but it was definitely our favorite one yet. There wasn’t much incline and it was about 5 miles total. (6.5 if you include all the walking around we did before we even arrived to the trail head) But all of it was so worth it. Only my hands were icicles by the end, and we both remained quite comfortable throughout the entire hike!
We enjoyed some wine snuggled up in the back of the camper van at the bottom of the mountain, and then we only had about a 1 hour drive to our next campsite.
Right after we hit the road, Christopher says, “babe, look behind us.” It was an incredible view of the mountains with all of the clouds cleared. We pull off to the side, and we hop into the middle of the street to take some photos. Christopher always has such an eye for the most beautiful sights, and I am so thankful we are able to capture these moments.
We drive, holding hands, listening to Chris Stapleton, and watching the sunset over the mountains, turning them pink. Life is good, and God is great. I couldn’t ask for any more, because I have more than all I will ever need.
Of course, we are now at another Top 10 Holiday Park in Omarama. All the towns always shut down before we arrive. Which we typically get in about 6pm, and I’m not exaggerating when I say everything is closed other than a small pub, maybe a hotel restaurant/bar, and a gas station. Luckily, we are all stocked up and are ready to call it a night.
Tonight’s agenda is organize photos, start planning Bali, and maybe even watch a little of our current favorite Netflix show: Narcos.
My highlight of the day is when we stopped on our way back from the turn around point on our hike. Christopher pulled up his shirt so I could warm my hands on his belly. We just stopped for a moment, hugged, warmed up, said I love you over and over, kissed, and joked how it was the first time all day that we had some privacy (since it’s a busier hike, especially on a Saturday). We also had to do little Eskimo kisses (also known as bunny kisses) ;)
Christopher said he’s unable to choose a highlight, because the day was just so incredible. There were too many great things to choose just one, but he immediately guessed mine before I said it out loud.
