Brewster Hut in Mount Aspiring National Park

The resorts of New Zealand are absolutely amazing but it’s the mountains that make the place so freaking special. When I arrived I had a bunch of experience in the North Cascades of Washington which are famous for long approaches, steep slopes and deep maritime snowpacks but the truth was that I was completely green in this range. What we call remote they call “Taiga Country” what we call a dismal snowpack they call abundant.

After the resorts shut down it quickly became obvious that we were going to have to work for our turns. This wasn’t something new to me but I was going to have to do a little bit of adjusting to get into the Kiwi style of ski mountaineering.

The plan was to spend a few days out at Brewster Hut in Mount Aspiring National Park. The weather forecast wasn’t looking the greatest but we decided to go for it.

Another thing I had to adjust to was the Hut system. This country is all time with over 800 shelters, mattress included. While not many are in the alpine there are a few here and there and the Brewster Hut is one of them.

After crawling through the forests for two hours we were up on a ridge. Soon enough we had made it to the Brewster Hut.

with the lack of trees a few clouds turned what was planned as an amazing trip into a total white out. If that wasn’t enough to make us nervous we were about to traverse over an exposed area.

Wanting to play it safe we decided to head back to the hut. We were fortunate that it was surrounded by scenic views. As we made it back to the Brewster Hut the weather cleared and we finally got a view of Mount Brewster.

That night we got a beautiful sunset alpenglow. While we weren’t able to ride Mount Brewster the view alone was worth it.

The next morning we packed up our packs and started making our way down the trail.

While the trip had not gone how I wanted I learned to respect how fast fronts come in. As we were only 20 km from the ocean weather can be nasty. It was my hope to return to Brewster Hut again.