The reunion evening for the South Island Christmas trip took place, as usual, at the Windsor Park Baptist Church, and drew about sixty people. People started coming in about 5pm for the pot-luck BBQ meal; a wet and miserable day meant nobody was game enough to cool off in the church’s swimming pool. Photo albums belonging to people who were on the South Island trip were displayed on tables at the back, along with the Club Album, and orders were being taken for copies of the trip photos.

Soon after 7:30pm, when most of the people were there, Phillip (sporting a head of very short freshly-bleached blond hair as part of a fundraising dag by the church he pastors) got us into our seats for our two-hour epidiascope journey back six weeks to the tramp. We started with the warm-up tramp on Mt Somers, squeezing into - and underneath - the Pinnacles Hut for the night to the strains of bass-drum music and flashes of light put on by Thor’s Thunderbirds with guest artist Lite Ning (they were the ones who entertained us at Miranda three years ago in Feb 1998). We then sped up the Dart River by jetboat to start the Dart-Matukituki but ended up coming down the Rees thanks to deep snow on the Cascade Saddle. It was an easy two hours on foot to our first hut, andthen a full day’s hard work to the Dart Hut. Our kiwi ingenuity and initiative rewarded four of us with bedspace in the Dart Hut’s tool shed, the hut itself being over-full for New Year’s eve. It was a steep climb to Rees Saddle, with ankle to knee deep snow, and an even steeper climb down to the relatively flat Rees valley. Snow was the dominating feature as we tramped the Routeburn Track, adding to the beauty of the mountains and lakes. Those on the cooking roster donned chef’s hats to ensure the food was really tasty. We joined in celebrating Peter and Val’s ruby wedding in a special concert of skits, songs and toasts. The real beauty was summed up at a still fine dawn on New Years Day by the lake around bread and wine thinking of the One who gave all this. The Wilkin-Young traverse started with an aeroplane ride or jetboat. We joined some of the group in a side trip to Lake Crucible, full of  mini-icebergs breaking off from the surrounding bluffs. Two people braved the freezing cold to get into togs and enjoy the water!  Then it was up and over the Gillespie Pass in the cold and rain, to a welcome stay at Young Hut after seven hours of wet slog. Our final port of call on the journey was Aspiring Hut where we were lucky to get any space at all - a climbing group had the use of the hut for the past week and some of them had just left to go home. Five of us sang a closing song to sum it all up, to the tune of Music of the Night, complete with snores and snorts!  Phillip then turned our thoughts towards our Father in a devotion based on a reading from The Word For Today where each one of us is a unique work of God’s creation with our different personalities. At 9:45pm we were back at Windsor Park Baptist Church for a lavish supper and more photo browsing.