Beats the Trail

“The Queen Charlotte Track is to the Appalachian Trail what the Ritz-Carlton is to a homeless shelter,” writes Angus Phillips for The Washington Post. Polar opposites. Phillips and a friend wanted to see the countryside, with its towering ferns and its clear subtropical bays, and, being of a certain age, they wanted to go in style. “Most New Zealand tracks are bridle trails from the days before the 1950s when folks got around mostly on foot or horseback. It’s soft ground and mellow walking. Even better, on the QC you don’t have to carry a big pack. Our destination lay four hours up the track: the No Road Inn, accessible only by water or foot. Owner Garry Ashton greeted us with ice-cold beers. The rooms were huge. The bathrooms had footed tubs with views of the water, the bedrooms overlooked the bay. Soft terry robes and flat-screen TVs beckoned. Ashton led us out to a steaming hot tub made from an old wine barrel and warned that dinner was in half an hour. The Marlborough Sounds area was mostly sheep stations until 1979, we learned, when Montana produced the first bottles of sauvignon blanc. The wine was superb; the world came running. Thirty years later along we came, walking in the finest way, with full stomachs, no heavy packs on our backs, soft beds and crisp sheets waiting. It sure beats the Appalachian Trail.”