A friend and I hiked out that night and were caught by another cold evening and morning. Luckily, we were climbing up to another saddle and as we walked past bush line, the sun hit our backs and the day warmed up. Up and over the saddle, we then climbed down a river valley that opened up into a much bigger river. We scrambled down the side and plowed straight into the river thinking it was like any other. About halfway through, my legs began to feel weak and I felt very unstable as I looked at the rest of the river I still had to cross. Clutching my brand new camera and quickly sneaking my ipod into a higher pocket, I kept moving. As we finished crossing, we looked at the bank on the otherside and realized that the only way out of the river banks was to climb straight up a wall of loose rock. After some cursing, slipping, and utter disbelief that this was the trail, we made it up and kept moving. The wind was relentless and I pictured myself trying to set up my tent in it later. It would not be easy. Luckily, by the end of our day, we got to a private hut that wasn't on our maps and it was open! We ran inside and were finally protected from the wind that had bashed us all day. I was even more thankful when it began to rain later that night. We slept in the next morning but reluctantly left in the rain. We were climbing up to another saddle and I began to panic, thinking of how the last time I had walked up to a saddle in the rain hadn't gone so well. We ran into another friend on the way up and I felt much safer, knowing the three of us could take this on together. My panic was all for naught once we got to the top and the wind had died down and it was actually warm. We ran down the otherside and the rain slowly let up fir the sun to come out. That afternoon the trail turned into a tough bush tramp. We were in and out of rivers, climbing steep banks, and trying to follow the track as much as possible. The day capped off with an immense climb like I've never experienced on any other trail. We were walking straight up for about 2 kilometers that went in and out of forest sections to being completely exposed on the side of a cliff. There were more than a few occasions where I felt very unsafe but I made it to the hut just as it began to rain again and settled in for the night. The next day we hiked up to a summit and spent the first part of the day on an exposed ridge that had incredible views of the southern alps. The track down was much like the climb up to the hut had been and my legs were shaky by the time we reached the road at the bottom and got into town. We met up with a bunch of friends in town who were planning a little reroute of the trail in order to hike some more desirable sections of trail. We joined them and left the next day to climb Cascade saddle. We got just under the saddle and set up camp for the night. We were completely frozen, just under alpine zone but we got a bit of sleep. I woke up to about seven Keas tramping about our campsite. Keas are the most intelligent bird in the world and are extremely pesky because they like to figure out how things work, often ruining shoes, tents, food bags, or anything they can get their beaks on. I jumped out if my tent to fight them off but realized they had already gotten to the handle of my trekking pole and had ripped most of the foam off. Seemingly satisfied, they left everything else alone. We had a beautiful day going up and over the saddle and I got to experience my first glaciers in New Zealand. It was an absolutely spectacular day ended by getting to a warm hut and turning in. About 30 minutes after we had snuggled in for the evening, a man came into the bunk room looking for the "fit hikers." I was one of the only ones still awake so I got our of bed to see what the commotion was. A group of nine elderly hikers had made it about 30 minutes back before dropping their packs on the trail and venturing to the hut without them. Now they were looking for people to go back and get them. The group looked extremely exhausted and one man had a busted eye and scraped up most of his face. I got ready to venture our but was relieved of my trip when I heard others had already headed out for the abandoned packs. The man was being checked out by someone more medically qualified than my expired Wilderness First Responder, so I went back to bed. The next day we headed out into the rain and had a quick day to the next hut where the hut warden had just shot a deer and gave us part of the shoulder to cook up on the stove. It tasted incredible and it was such a treat to have fresh meat on trail. The rain only got worse as the evening went on and then the wind began to come in. Sheets of rain were being blown sideways and the rivers were beginning to swell. We spent the next day hiding out from the weather in the hut and were astounded by the multiplying waterfalls coming down from the ridge. It was still raining the next day when we went to leave the hut but we were running out of food and had to keep moving. We bid farewell to our friends we had made during our day in the hut and headed out. We got to two extremely swollen waterfall crossings that I would have never attempted if I had been alone. We made it through together and kept tramping down the river that was now the trail. I got moving a bit fast and suddenly my feet were coming out from underneath me and I came down hard on my hip and shoulder. The only thing I could do was roll over and laugh, hoping the pain would go away. I popped back up and a friend mentioned something about not breaking my ipod that I had just realized was in the pocket of the hip I had fallen on. It was too wet to check it then but I would find out later I had cracked half the screen with my embarrassing slip. We kept moving though I was falling a bit behind everyone trying to ignore the heat I felt in my hip. I got to a flatter section and made the move to try to catch up when I kicked a rock with the side of my foot and saw my small toe flip around backwards. I bit my lip but kept moving, taking deep breathes trying to pretend I hadn't just broken my toe. Suddenly it was nice to be walking in the ice cold water that slowly numbed my feet and took the pain away. We got to a car park and begged some people for a ride to our next track. Luckily we got there with incredible speed and began hiking up to the saddle to spend the night. The rain had eased up for a bit but everything was still pretty wet. The track was incredible, we got to walk through waterfalls and caves, climb up rivers, and pop up over ridges to find secret lakes and valleys hidden by the landscape. When we got to the saddle, we were all soaked to the bone and shuffled into the leaking emergency shelter for the night. Everything was still pretty wet the next morning but we packed up and moved on. We got back into a town and will be getting back on the Te Araroa from here to finish out the last bit of the hike. Kilometer 2782