Me and Tim decide to go, for the queen’s birthday, to Ben More hut for three days with only a tarp, food, warm cloth, hatchets, saw and knife. However, the weather was very bad the Saturday and so we decide to do a safer option: Bealey hut. In Arthur pass this small hut is 5-10 minutes walk from the car park so that, in case of issues, we can still quickly get out. So we go buy some nice food to cook on campfire, travel to Sheffield do a pie stop. Until porters pass the whole area was full of snow and the snow was falling around. We drove through castle hill area under the snow, astonishing, then at the hut arrived about 2 pm. We hiked to the hut with our heavy backpacks. Dropped everything there and looked for a place to set up our camp.
After we found a nice place and started to build a shelter we decide to pass the first night in the hut. We were back just before dark with wood for fire unfortunately it was wet and we spent a few hours to start a fire and cooked our first meal: a potato and pumpkin soup with some roast camembert.We finally succeed and go back in the hut due to the blizzard outside. Play some music and card game, pass a good night there. We woke up at 8-9 am with a very cold but beautiful day. I start to prepare a bread dough for later, let it rise in my sleeping bag, then we cut and chop wood to prepare a good fire. Around 11 am we finally start the fire which took a good hour to be light. We decide to stay the second night in the hut. For lunch I prepared with the dough a pizza with mushroom, chorizo, onion, cheese and tomato sauce. We just put directly on the ember with an aluminum foil to cook it (very good but burn on the bottom). We spend the rest of the day to chop more wood for the dinner feed the fire grow it and playing some harmonica and tin whistle.
I try to carve spoon on the wood but it was not a big success. Finally, we start to cook a full chicken. After three hours the chicken was cooked we eat it with ember roast potatoes and camembert again (yes I love camembert in the camp fire).
Go to bed, wake up in the morning clean everything and go back home under a beautiful sun.
Maxime Savoie
CUTC 