Day 4: (Fri 14th Mar 2008): John Sutton spent a claimed comfortable night in his tent (got a bit crowded in the hut). The Engineers looked at the leaking tap on the quite small water tank and realised the tap needed tightening but couldn't be held from inside as the lid was screwed in. However, this appeared biologically difficult, requiring an unusually long arm or small enough body to climb in!!. The interim solution was to leave a billy underneath the drip and use this for our water supply.

After a little scramble to bypass a gorge (which I managed with no hands) we were out on the Taipo River flats with grand views in glorious weather.

The plan was to cross the Taipo to avoid the "extremely steep track... up and over a bluff to Scotty's Cableway" but even Ian was up to his waist crossing so 6 of us decided the climb didn't sound too bad. The slate on the ascent made climbing very difficult so we were all very pleased to reach the top. The descent was tricky (especially without hands).

If we had actually read the track description of ""continue across boldery riverbeds..." we wouldn't have headed up from the cableway along a track that peters out onto a near verticle cliff with few hand-holds (even worse when one has no grip in either hand!). A few idiots like me made it down, the others back-tracked and eventually came along the river bank. We also missed the turn off to Dillan Hut but found Dillan Homestead a day early!