This is the second part of our adventure to Earnslaw Burns. The last story started with the lead up to the unexpected adventure and ended with us staying at the coolest campsite ever and sleeping under the stars. Give it a read! The Adventure at Earnslaw Burns (Pt. 1)
The Next Morning
Abel and I woke up as the stars are fading and we watched the sun come up as we ate breakfast. I sometimes don’t realize how lucky we are to be here. To watch the sun disappear to reveal the starry night sky, which fades away as the sun rises to engulf the world in its fiery glow. I hope through these stories, people will get out and not only to see our beautiful world but to live in it.
My campsite for the night
We were supposed to bring the car back by 4 pm so we figure some exploration is in order before we haul ass back to the car. So we dropped our packs and meandered our way through the fields and rolling hills towards the cliffs and waterfalls. Our plan was to get to the bottom of the cliff for a close look and then head back.
The wilderness always finds ways to satisfy our curiosity. We were greeted by a Kea on the way, the colorful mountain parrot that roams the alpines of New Zealand. The magnificent bird perching on the rock, studying us before taking flight, soaring into the background.
Can you spot the Kea, actually probably not 😂
I would always joke about how New Zealand names their birds like how they name Pokémon. The joke often followed by me trying to inmate their bird calls using their name… Keeeeaa! Kakaaah! which will always result in Abel shaking his head in disappointment of me. My joke gets old quick… 🙁
We walked on, the sense of exploration tugging us closer towards those towering impenetrable cliffs. Perspectives change as you get closer. The sound of the waterfalls transitioning from the sounds of percussion to war drums. You slowly start to feel so small as you crank your neck to look at the towering cliffs above.
Finding Ice Cave
Abel and I stopped at the base of the cliff to admire the views and was about to turn back when I found our next adventure. On the right, a steep scree slope that seemed to lead further up the cliff. I turned to Abel and said: “Hey I think we can hike up the cliff, wanna go?” even though I already knew the answer. To our satisfaction, it led us around the corner to the large platform halfway up the cliff face.
This is where I saw something incredible, an ice cave at the edge of the wall. Forgetting about the tiredness we charged towards it with excitement, couldn’t wait to see what we will find. Finally, at the edge of the cave, we stopped to admire it in amazement. This ice cave was twice as tall as a man at the highest point, created by a waterfall flowing through a giant patch of snow.
Cave Entrance
We noticed that the ceiling was very thick so we calmed our nerves and decided it was good enough to not collapse while we were in it. Even though I know it was safe it was still so difficult not picturing the image of the ceiling collapsing. This was my first time being in an ice cave and it turned out to be the wildest one. The tunnel was about 15 meters long, a creek noisily flowing underfoot, water from the melting ice dripping wildly from above. Walking through it was so calming and yet intense, maybe that was just my semi-rational fear of being buried by snow. The other side of the cave was like a room from another dimension, walls of ice and rock seem to converge, creating a canopy of ice and rock where the waterfall falls right through.
Backside of the cave
I was mesmerized by this, walking back and forth in the cave, looking at everything over and over again like I might forget it if we don’t look hard enough. By the time I came around, Abel was gone. I left the cave puzzled, started heading down thinking he left when I heard him shouting from above. “Come this way!” I went after him towards the other side of this platform that led right up to the main waterfall. This thing was tall! There was mist flying everywhere, water hitting the rocks so loudly it was hard to hear anything else. What we thought was a thin stream from afar, was instead a monster dwarfed by the even bigger cliff.
Satisfied with our exploration of this place, we headed back to our campsite and started to hike out. It was pretty uneventful until we saw and familiar face. “Nathan!” I exclaimed, “You made it!” He did not look happy though and we found out why soon enough.
The Game of Clues
It turns out, he wanted to quickly fly his drone out towards the waterfalls and as he turned the bend, the drone got too close to the steep bush covered side of the valley and crashed into an unknown location. He started walking up to the side of the valley and at first, Abel and I stayed put as we thought it would be an easy find with the GPS location. After about half an hour or so, I woke up from a nap with Nathan still on the hill. At this point, we thought maybe we should help.
This started out like a murder mystery with three clues, the GPS location, the last second of video recording and the current view of the camera. Like an exciting game, we tried to piece together where the drone is from the view of it. At first we followed the GPS, searching through thick brushes for the type of plants shown in the images. This whole time, this other couple of campers looked at us from below like we are crazy people.
After about an hour of combing through the hillside with zero luck, I realized we missed an important clue. You can match the snow patches on the glacier with the screenshot from the drone video. The position of the snow relative to the hill in the foreground was off in our current view. The drone has to be higher, above this small cliff.
Yikes, what do we do now? Nathan wanted to attempt it by going around the cliff so we decided to go to the bottom and try to direct him to a right place. This feels like watching climbers on the North face of Eiger from the ski resort, except much more intense. So much suspense as he moved slowly up the slope to the place where we thought the drone would be. After so much waiting around in suspense, we heard a cheer and we proceeded to holler back in return, happy for his bad luck turned good. Dibs on MVP for figuring out the important clue XD
So that’s the conclusion to our adventures and misadventures. Well, the other exciting thing was that we wore jackets with the same shade of blue so we got a sweet group photo. At the end of it all, we walked down exhausted by the late afternoon, completely blew the deadline to return the car. That night, we ate a lot of ice cream and lamb and slept like a baby. I couldn’t ask for a better way to end this trip to New Zealand.
It’s adventures like this that makes me want to explore more. To go off in the wild and find new places no one knows about. To meet friends along the way and laugh about the adventures and misadventures. I want my life to be about creating new adventures at every opportunity and I hope I can inspire you to do the same.
