Ah! well do we remember the miseries and discomforts of the scene. Wind blowing in fitful gusts, rain coming down in sheets, while thunder and lightning and the incessant roar of the Tasman all tended to make the scene one of terror and discomfort. Matches nearly all destroyed; bread reduced to a state of pulp; blankets and clothes wet; instruments, boots, ropes, ice-axes muddled up anywhere, some in the tent, some being silted up or washed away from the spot where the tent was first pitched; the floor of the tent now hard, wet stones, in lieu of comfortable, dry tussock. Oh, the misery of it!
We lay in our wet clothes the rest of that night, all the following day, and the next night. Inglis and I scarcely stirred but to eat some disgusting, soppy mixture or to light our pipes; but Dixon pluckily rigged up a break-wind with an old tent left by the Birch Hill shepherds, and after three hours’ persistent labour kindled a fire, improvising a chimney out of a pair of white flannel trousers and sundry other garments!
We were quite hemmed in by water, and were in a constant state of anxiety lest the river should make depredations in our direction, as it was quite close to us, whilst in the creek on the other side we could hear the rocks being rolled down by the force of water.
Nine inches of rain had fallen during the forty-eight hours, but on the Sunday it cleared, and once again the warm sun shone out, the clouds drifted away from the mountains, the birds began to sing, and the waters subsided as quickly as they had risen, and our spirits rose again as we spread out our wet belongings on the scrub and donned a shirt, hat, and a pair of boots apiece, and set out for a visit to the scene of devastation at the face of the glacier whence the river issues. The costume was airy but convenient, as we had to cross several streams before reaching our destination.
We were well rewarded for our walk, for a wonderful sight was presented where the river flows out from the glacier. For a distance of half a mile from the face the banks of the main stream were strewn with blocks of ice of all sizes up to twelve or fifteen feet in thickness. At one spot the river rushed in mad violence from a great cavern of ice; in another it rose as from a geyser from under the ice, sending up a large column of water to a height of six or eight feet.
It was quite a new sensation to be dry again, but that night rheumatism screwed my joints, and some venomous insect bit my shoulder, causing intense pain for a short time.
While the rain continued we had all thought of falling back on the Hermitage as soon as we were able, but a bright sunny morning caused us to change our plans and forge ahead for the Ball Glacier camp, weakened though we were in strength and supplies.
Already we felt that our chance of ascending Aorangi was gone, for the snow lay thick on the upper peaks and avalanches were of common occurrence; yet we doggedly pushed on, determined not to turn without a struggle.
Leaping from rock to rock, avoiding the scrub and Spaniards by sticking to the moraine slopes, and scrambling over great tali of boulders which came from the mountain sides, by evening we reached our destination (the Ball Glacier), and finding the surveyor’s chain, tent poles, and hatchet—left by Fox and myself the previous season—in good order, we quickly had a comfortable camp pitched. A small army of mountain parrots or keas soon assembled, and the unerring shanghai procured grilled kea for supper.
Next morning broke gloriously fine, and by 7 a.m. we were away with blanket-bags, three days’ ‘tucker,’ and a change of warm clothing, intending to reach Green’s bivouac on the Haast Ridge that evening, and to make a final dash at Aorangi on the day following.