SNOW LEVEL SOUTHERN FIORDLND
Original post
Anyone been near Te Anau or the South Coast of Fiordland in the last couple of days who can tell me where the snow line is at? Planning some mainly low-level bush stuff - but carrying an injury and not keen on slogging days through snow-laden bush if snow really did fall down to 200m as-per the forecast. Cheers in advance
Friend of mine was at Luxmoore hut on the Kepler on the weekend. There was soft knee deep snow near the hut, track was buried and impassible beyond. Noones been over the top to Iris Burn in 2 weeks (according to the hut ranger... there’s still a ranger up there in June!).
In other words, there’s lots of snow around above bush line and it’s deep!
Thanks @yarmoss. Any idea how low down into bush it went? Thinking a trip over to Poteriteri so a lot of time around 5-600m. Assuming there'll be stuffall that low. But would be nice to know if I'm wrong!
I’ll ask him tomorrow if I see him. I doubt it would be down that low, but you never know.
No worries @yarmoss. I'll be down that way tomorrow morning, so will find out one way or the other. Thanks for the info.
My friend said the snow was about 50-100m down into the trees at Queens Birthday. Looking at the map that would have been at about 900m. He said the main problem was ice underfoot, particularly on the boardwalk/stairs around the sandstone bluffs which are at the 800m contour. A problem for over engineered tracks! You shouldn’t have those difficulties on the route to Poteriteri 🙂
Talk to someone in Tuatapere, try the Info Centre or one of the Jet Boat Operators and ask them to look out the window. My impression is that there is snow above the bush line but not too much within the bush, it's warmed up quite a bit since Wednesday when it was snowing hard.
Thanks for all that. Walked the Poteriteri loop clockwise so didn't hit the high stuff till today. Snow down to about 800m coming out over The Hump. Horrible stuff - knee to waist deep with a not-quite-strong-enough ice crust.
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| Forum | Tracks, routes, and huts |
|---|---|
| Started by | madpom |
| On | 7 June 2018 |
| Replies | 7 |
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