SUMMITING MOUNT CRICHTON

If you’re looking for a challenging off-the-beaten-path hike near Queenstown, the summit of Mount Creighton should be on the shortlist.

There are various routes to take to reach the 1870 metre peak. But one thing is for sure, this is a hike you should only do in summer, and when the weather is looking good all day.

Note: I’ll be talking about going to the Mount Crichton summit as a traverse, starting from the Sam Summers car park (here) and finishing at Avalanche Creek car park (here). You could do an out and back hike from either end if you wanted.

This post will get into the details about hiking to the summit of Mount Creighton. And no, it’s not the Mount Crichton Loop Track. That’s a lovely hike you can do all year round.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Details About Hiking To Mount Crichton
2. Mount Crichton Hiking Map
3. How To Get To The Trailhead
4. My Experience Hiking To The Mount Crichton Summit

1. DETAILS ABOUT HIKING TO MOUNT CRICHTON

How hard is it to hike to the summit of Mount Crichton?

This is a hard hike. It took me five attempts to reach the summit (one of those things nothing seemed to go right). Crikey it was a relief when I made it.

If you know where you’re going, you could potentially downgrade it to medium difficulty, but you’re on an unmarked route for the majority of the trip and will need to make some decisions that aren’t always easy to follow on a topo map with a GPX file.

That said, there’s no reason why anyone without a little fitness, nice weather, and lots of daylight can’t attempt the summit. As long as you’re prepared to turn back when things aren’t right.

How long is the hike to Mount Crichton?

The route we took was 13.1km, with the summit 8.6km into the hike.

I feel like that’s a fairly accurate number, but don’t be surprised if there’s a 1-2km difference which will be a result of taking different routes/lines on the ridgeline and descent. And you can add a bit of distance if you head to Lake Isobel (see photo below).

How many hours does the hike up Mount Crichton take?

This is going to vary a lot from person to person. And there are no DOC guidelines to give a base figure. It took us a total of 6 hours and 45 minutes from start to finish which includes an hour or so of rest time – possibly more.

Now that we know the route we could definitely go faster. The same can be said if we didn’t stay high on the ridgeline for so long either.

That said, we’re both reasonably fit and can keep up a solid speed on descents and ascents. I can imagine this might take upwards of 8-9 hours for some.

How much elevation gain is there?

Our route measured in at 1796 metres of elevation gain on Strava. That’s a good elevation to distance (13.1km) ratio. The descent down Avalance Creek is steep which helps the ratio…and is one reason you might want to go in the opposite direction to us, if your knees get wrecked on steep descents.

Here’s the elevation profile:

Is there reception on the track?

There is on some sections of the ridgeline and at the summit, but don’t expect the reception to be strong. You shouldn’t rely on it. At both car parks, I didn’t get reception.

Should I take a PLB for this hike?

I don’t think this is 100% necessary on this attempt as there’s some cell phone coverage, but it’s never a bad idea to carry a personal locater beacon with you. A PLB can be hired throughout NZ (Macpac and DOC visitor centres) if you haven’t got your own.

I was lucky, my friend bought his.

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2. MOUNT CRICHTON HIKING MAP

Clicking the image below will open the route on topomap.co.nz.

The map above is the GPX file from my Strava recording on a topo map. Despite how long the hike feels, it’s crazy how small an area you cover is next to the Queenstown to Glenorchy scenic drive.

The route isn’t on Maps.me, Google Maps, or the topo maps. So I’d recommend downloading one of the best-hiking apps for NZ (app #3 in that post, NZTOPOS), download the GPX file and keeping that on hand.

3. HOW TO GET TO THE TRAILHEAD

You’ve got a couple of options with most of them that take you between Queenstown and Glenorchy possible. But the annoying part is to do the traverse you’ll need to have two cars or involve some hitchhiking.

We parked at the Mt Crichton Loop Track and managed to hitchhike back to the car park afterwards. If you’ve got two cars, this might be the most efficient route. That said, hitchhiking from Queenstown and back shouldn’t be too hard either.

4. MY EXPERIENCE HIKING TO THE MOUNT CRICHTON SUMMIT

After four failed attempts at reaching the summit, I was stoked that I had three things going for me on what would be the day I finally summited:

• a great forecast
• a good mate who I knew would be able to summit
• friends who were ready to laugh at me if I didn’t make it :p

We started off at a reasonable 10 am on the Mount Crichton Loop track, one that both of us have done several times in the past. You turn left at the junction of the loop crossing the bridge. Enjoy the maintained track, it’s going to be a while until you see a decent trail again 🙂

Now, the trickiest part is to find the trail that takes you off the loop track and get started up the real guts of the track.

What I would suggest is you look at the topo map really close before you go, so you know roughly where the turnoff is going to be (~2km from the car park). The turnoff is not marked, and unless you’re really looking for it, you’d never know it’s there.

Walking from the car park (clockwise around the loop), the turnoff is on your left hand side. You won’t see the trail immediately, but if you feel like you’re at the right place, venture left for 5 – 10 metres and you’ll soon know if you’re on the correct trail or not. There is a trail that has formed.

It’s hard to explain…on my next trip I’ll take a photo of where the turn-off is. The turnoff is past the Maori Gully bridge, but do fill up your water bottles here as you won’t be having any water sources after this (you could drink from Lake Isobel).

Once you make a left, you’re in for a grueling climb of 1.5km up a single trail, which has some steeper sections, through the bush. But it’s quite a beautiful walk if you’re not too knackered to be able to appreciate it. And it’ll be the last time you’re in the bush for the rest of the trip.

Once you’re above the bush line, you’ll be looking up a steep climb to get to the first great viewpoint which is about 900 metres or so. It’s not super easy to find the route all the time, but as long as you’re going up, you’re not going to be too far off track. Again, keep an eye on your topo map.

Take a break and enjoy the view 😀

From here, the ridgeline is relatively easy to follow and you can see Mount Crichton in the distance, kind of. In theory, you could drop down to the valley on the right and follow that all the way up and you’d end up at lake Isobel. But ridgelines are the best!

Once you get to 1300 metres you’ll have started climbing up some scree. The top of this section is just over 1432 on the topo map. My friend decided to sidle along as he was sick of going up. I loved going to the top of the ridge and following that though.

Enjoy this next 1km or so to point 1390, as after that it’s going to get tough the rest of the way.

At this point, you’ll start going up steeply for a couple of hundred metres. There’s still a vague trail at times, but you’ll need to make your own judgment on many points as you’ll start to find the exposure levels quite nasty at times.

We both found that we were scrambling quite a bit but didn’t feel out of our depth. A few months earlier (November) I had turned back along this ridge as there was still some snow about and we weren’t confident about continuing.

Don’t let your ego get in the way on this ridgeline.

As much as I would have loved to keep scrambling, we did drop down to the Lake Wakatipu side of the ridgeline soon after the 1723 point. This isn’t an easy descent down some scree, but it was fun. Then from there, we continued following the ridgeline but below it on the way to Mount Creighton.

We were aiming for a small gap we could see close to point 1787. This is a point where two ridgelines meet and is close to Mount Creighton.

Once you see Mount Crichton you can tackle it from a few directions, but we went past the peak along a relatively flat section that features some tarns and came up around the other side.

It’s basically a choose your own adventure when you decide to turn up towards the summit (the summit is one of those in the photo above), things get steep. This is another reason it’s best tackled in good conditions. We popped out on the ridge a short walk from the peak which was marked with a cairn, and closely studied the topo map to make sure we were at Mount Creighton itself.

You’ve had some great views throughout the hike, but enjoy the full panaroamic views, they’re glorious. And you might want to pop down to Lake Isobel for a swim. We didn’t, next time.

After you’ve enjoyed your summit time, it’s time to plunge down. This again is kind of a choose your own adventure as you plummet down the valley towards Lake Whakatipu. You can get an idea of the route we took based on the GPX file but you can go any number of ways that suit your eye.

There’s no trail for quite a while, and some of the tussocks and Spaniards are just waiting for you to fall over…it’s tough-going at times.

But eventually you’ll see some poles that indicate a marked route which is the Avalanche Creek Track. From here, you’ll be back on a track and have a descent that’s still steep close to a fence line down the hill. But at least there’s a track.

Once you get to the bottom, you’ll see a gate on your right. Cross the gate and follow the track for about 500 metres until you see the Avalanche Creek Track car park (here).

If you’ve done the two-car mission, you’re home and hosed. If like us you didn’t, we stuck our thumb out right next to the car park entrance and got a ride straight away.

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Summiting Mount Crichton became a bucket list of sorts for me after I didn’t make it a few times.

If you’re planning to do the summit, wait for a summer’s day when the days are long and the weather is settled. This will give you the best chance at summiting and you’ll have time to go for a swim in Lake Isobel without being crazy cold.

If you’ve got any questions about summiting Mount Crichton, drop a comment below or email jub@churnewzealand.com.

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