My plans to summit Mt Catherine in mid winter turned out to be a bit ambitious, but spectacular views from the minor peak at 1877m made this an excellent walk regardless. The grandeur of the Arrowsmith Range is to the west, many snowy mountains to the north, and Mt Catherine itself to the east. To the south-west are the wide open plains of the Ashburton Lakes area.
When I set off there was a lot of low cloud, which got worse before it got better, but at ~1600m I broke through the cloud and suddenly felt very high up. You need access permission from Lake Heron Station to approach to the mountain from the west – see my track notes at the end.
Mt Catherine to 1877m: The Scenery
Video from the summit:
Track Notes
Access
You need permission from Lake Heron Station to walk this route. They were very easygoing and asked me to park just inside the entrance to the farmyard next to two poplars. Phone 03 318 5822. They offer accommodation on their land which would be the luxury way to climb the mountain.
You could also approach the mountain from the car park at Lake Heron (my start point for Mt Taylor when I did it), but that would involve a different route up from the south.
Route Notes
Follow the farm road until you approach the base of the mountain. You can pass through a farm gate and walk on a grassy track of sorts to near the conservation area boundary. Hop the low fence to enter the conservation area. From there you can pick your way through the bushes towards the westerly spur, which is a mixture of tussock and other subalpine plants, rocks, and coarse scree. As I got higher there was blanketed snow and because some of it was icy I put my crampons on.
On the way down I used an area of snow (and at the bottom, some scree) to aid my descent almost to the bottom of the mountain. Without snow it might all have been scree. See my photo below…
Once the terrain became rocky the snow was of variable depths – often deep – and this slowed my progress. It was like this past 1877m for quite a while so I decided not to try for the summit. It would have taken too long. I’ll return in late spring I think (after lambing) to do this last bit. Or I might take the long route up from Lake Heron.
