Rakiura Track

The Rakiura Track is a 29 km tramping track located on Stewart Island, New Zealand. It is one of the New Zealand Great Walks. It generally follows the coastline for a large parts of its length, passing small inlets, large bays and mudflats, before crossing steep hills covered in bush (dense forest) during its middle section.

It lies within the Rakiura National Park and can be walked over a one to three day period. There are two huts on the track, at Port William and the North Arm of Paterson Inlet, and many people overnight at each.

Large sections of the track have wooden boardwalks covered with wiremesh to protect the track from deterioration. Without these, the track often degrades into mud, as Stewart Island receives immense amounts of rain during the year. In general, the track is well-maintained, and of easy to medium difficulty. The given track length does not include several additional km sections of paved road at the start and end of the walk from Half Moon Bay.

The track is equipped with huts for the use of permit-carrying walkers, and the huts are equipped with firewood, which is in fact, often flown in by helicopter [" [http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=3535218 DOC apologises after chopping ancient trees] " - "The New Zealand Herald", Thursday 20 November 2003] as no roads connect to many of the huts and walkers are not supposed to cut their own wood.

References

External links

* [http://www.doc.govt.nz/templates/trackandwalk.aspx?id=36608 Rakiura Track] (from the Department of Conservation website)