Second hiking trip, part 2

Step by step we got closer to the top and reached the hut after three and a half hour, despite the fact that it had 50cm snow on the upper part of the track. We were the first ones today, but just a half an hour later the warden arrived at the hut too. He’s up here quite often and has climbed Mt. Cook several times. While we were cooking our lunch and trying to dry our socks and shoes, he cleaned the deck from the snow. We offered him some tea and therefore he told us about the possible peaks we could climb today or the next day. We decided to discover the way for tomorrow to Mt. Sealy and after two hours we return to the hut again, well not exactly, we went up on a ridge to look at the sunset. We had lots of time and waited over an hour, until the light was perfect for taking pictures. Up there we met our two Spanish guys again, who started after us, because they had arrived at the village this morning.
When we went back to the hut, however, it was almost full, with about twenty people and most of them would walk down again tomorrow. We had other plans and wanted to get up early the next day and follow our footprints until it would be bright enough.

My alarm clock rang at ten to six, so got up. Surprisingly I slept pretty good, although my sleeping bag’s comfort temperature is fifteen degrees. I wanted to wake up Victor, but he was disappeared with he’s mattress. I finally found him in the living/kitchen room beside the windows. He changed place because in the dorm were too many snoring people.
It was still dark outside and I took my camera to take some long exposure pictures. In the east I could see some brighter stars and I was sure these must be some planets. Later, a woman explained me they are Jupiter, Venus, Mars and Mercury and last weekend they were in one line and now they had already changed their place a bit.

Instead of walking in the dark we took pictures of the stars and the sunset. We finally started after seven o’clock and we went on fast. My legs felt tired and spite of leaving some clothes and the sleeping bag in the hut, my backpack wasn’t that light. After three hours we reached our turning point before Mt. Sealy, because we couldn’t cross the glacier safely enough. From there we had an amazing panorama and a great view down on the huge Annette plateau.
After that we walked down and looked for a good place, where we could cook with our little cooker. We ate pasta carbonara.

On the way back to hut we were even faster and so after six hours we arrived back at the hut. We cooked some food, which was left and we would have to carry it down, when we don’t eat it. This was also the place were we attached the crampons and axes back at the backpack, we wouldn’t use them anymore. At three o’clock we left the hut and went down to the car, where we met a staff member of the DOC (department of conservation), who had driven to the car park and looked now for returning hikers. We brought back our rental equipment and finally drove back to Queenstown.