Bushwalk Australia

Hi, I'm keen to hear any suggestion you may have for a 3 to 4 day walk in the South Island, that uses huts. We were planning on doing the Routeburn Trk just before easter 2016, but at $800 for a family to a do a great walk with transfers, na. Might be great but I know another valley and pass can also be just as great. The kids will be 7 and 9, are reasonably hardy, are outdoor hardened, but are still kids. Can't slog them up and over scree slopes and passes all day long. So happy for a bit of back country, probably need a foot pad, maybe a rope bridge or two, but needs to use huts to keep the weight down as I and the wife will be carrying most of the loud.

Greenstone/Caples/Mavora or combinations of), Hump Ridge. There are plenty of others but probably not suitable for kids of that age (even the ones listed would depend on weather, season, individual capabilities etc.).

St James Walkway near Lewis Pass. Also - lots of possible walks in NW Nelson area (Kahurangi National Park) e.g. Wangapecka Track, Mt Arthur, Cobb Valley. Travers-Sabine loop at Nelson Lakes.

Thanks guys, I'll do some homework. Have heard of many of them, but it has been some time and I have forgotten a fair bit of NZ.
After I posted I found St James walkway. Not sure if I'm going soft, or I'm thinking soft for the kids, but tough 6 x 10km day would be a bit much for the 7 yo. I'd like it to fun for them all the way for most part, and as specie as it can be. I found the Nina Track on the other side of the highway to St James. Harder rating but shorter days, I think the climb to the pass is where it may get an advanced rating, and then their is a bivouac shelter. Which means I need to carry tents incase it's occupied. But figured if the kids can't do a 3hr walk in 12+ hrs of daylight I may as well give up. Not sure really, plenty to pondering and read.

I second the Mavora walkway, perfect distances and better weather than down south. Not sure how rough the track was from memory but its not steep.

Thanks again. Mavora seems like a sensible choice, we are in Wanaka and Queenstown areas. Just ned to find the time to do some reading.

Wayne, I was on that site the other night. Awesome really and a credit to your Government. You Kiwi have it together, Aus is a long long long looooong way behind promoting walks for it's people or any tourist for that matter.

I am keen to hear how it goes.

I took my 3 and 5yo on a 50km walk this year. Back-to-back 5-10km days. I was surprised at how well they handled it. We just plodded along (the 3yo did a 13km day toward the end... I had miscalculated and expected a huge 9km day, but the track turned out to be 11km.... and then after we set up camp they were raring to go do another 2km loop track. I was both surprised and impressed at what they could handle... But I must emphasise, we plodded so slowly, and the terrain was largely flat).

Does it have to be hut based? What about Queen Charlotte Track?

newhue wrote:Hi, I'm keen to hear any suggestion you may have for a 3 to 4 day walk in the South Island, that uses huts. We were planning on doing the Routeburn Trk just before easter 2016, but at $800 for a family to a do a great walk with transfers, na. Might be great but I know another valley and pass can also be just as great. The kids will be 7 and 9, are reasonably hardy, are outdoor hardened, but are still kids. Can't slog them up and over scree slopes and passes all day long. So happy for a bit of back country, probably need a foot pad, maybe a rope bridge or two, but needs to use huts to keep the weight down as I and the wife will be carrying most of the loud.

Also, double check your prices. Last time I checked kids (under 16) were free on the great walks.
http://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recrea ... urn-track/

One more thought to add regarding the suitability of the Routeburn track. It has extra huts along the way which make it much more family friendly. Both the Routeburn Flats hut and the Lake Howden hut are quite and, for us, made the perfect start and end to an otherwise very busy track.

pay attention to the weather, you're heading into the autumn storms that can stop you from completing trips especially in exposed areas or where there are unbridged water courses, have a plan b for those circumstances. any doubts contact the local DOC office about your plans and who you have in your group., look at alerts for tracks, there can be issues with storm damage , damaged bridges and tracks.

Actually because the Routeburn has hut wardens, and gas, it was a plus for us to do the walk. By providing daily weather reports it gives us some predictability of success if things turn pear shaped. We could just sit it out and wonder at the NZ rain. Of course if the forecast was bad for the week than we would just pull the pin, but that also becomes a pain if you have paid, and I'm not overly confident late March will be plain sailing and blue skies. It's one thing sitting at a desk in Qld heading into summer thinking how nice it will be, but I still remember when the NZ clag comes in how your beautiful day can turn into a cold wet miserable push. Kind of figured the kids will coupe, but only the once and we would have scared them for life if that happens. So short days, sunny weather, an easy pass would be very cool with some big mountain views, hopefully not to many people, and some quaint huts for added wonder for the kids, and lighten the load for mum and dad. Cant be too hard to find in NZ.
As for Routeburn pricing, kids are free, but adults are $50 per day, we were going to take 4 days, and $100 each for transfers, so basically $800. I know it's not that much, and probably is good value, but when you know what you get for free, it's just hard to cough up the cash.

Kainas, I thought the basic rule was walk their age, carry 1/4 of their weight. So for your 3yo to do 5 and 10km is very good. My 6 yo did 7km easy when he had some older boys to look up to. I think for him to do 7 on his own it would be quite painful unless we have some good wow factor going. Even then the acting will rival the best world cup soccer player.

On the first day they had to carry a backpack each (water, snacks, jumper), because we were doing an overnight and I had a huge pack on. They found that day hard going, even though the packs were very light (2kg at most) and the day was short.

The subsequent days we had car support, so only I carried a day pack with everything, and the kids were so much happier. The first time my eldest did a long walk was The Glow Worm Tunnel near Lithgow. It was about 9km with a huge incline. As you said, it was the motivation that helped her. She had another 5yo friend and I think they were so busy playing that they didn't realise that they were walking.

For the big walk I told lots and lots and lots of stories (which is very exhausting!!), and played games, and loads of snacks.