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NESTLED beneath the Darran Mountain Range, the Gertrude Valley begins with a carpark on the Milford Road, just before the eastern entrance to the Homer Tunnel. The valley has been described as perhaps the best one-day walk in Fiordland, even if you don’t make it to the epic Gertrude Saddle at the head of the valley, which is for more serious climbers but has a marvellous view down the valley in fine weather.
The Gertrude Saddle has great scenic views westward toward Milford Sound/Piopiotahi as well. It is, however, quite hazardous and needs to be approached with care, and only in good weather.
The valley is also prone to avalanches in the snow season. I heard that there had been a massive avalanche this winter, a few months before my latest visit.
The Gertrude Valley Track and the final route to the saddle are one-way and return. For, to add to the element of hazard, the western side of the saddle is a cliff, over which you will go if you keep blundering on in fog.
Here’s a useful overview from the New Zealand Mountain Safety Council, which emphasises risk management but also shows how scenic the valley is.
On my most recent trip, in November 2024, I went with a friend named Grant. We had planned to go to the saddle, but the weather was too dodgy, with a front coming in and high winds.
We met some students who had camped at the top and enjoyed fine weather, but such was not to be on the day we were there. So, Grant and I contented ourselves with looking at the scenery and vegetation in the lower part of the valley.
I had more luck on an earlier trip with my sister Maree. We stayed in a tent outside the Homer Hut near the start of the Gertrude Valley Track. This hut is owned by the New Zealand Alpine Club and is a simple, functional place with thirty bunk beds and no showers. It opened in 1965 and was refurbished in the summer of 2005–06.
The New Zealand Alpine Club (NZAC) has many dedicated members who look after their huts, which is becoming very important with the New Zealand Department of Conservation (DOC) pulling out of maintaining the huts. Often, when this happens, a person will adopt a hut and become responsible for its maintenance just to stop it from falling into disrepair.
(I also read in the NZAC log book, at Homer Hut, that the Southland Tramping Club was doing pest control in the valley.)
Many rock climbers stay at Homer Hut because the nearby Darran Mountain Range is a great area for rock climbing. With the proximity of the hut to Mount Talbot, Mount Crosscut and Mount Moir, climbers have plenty of options for day trips or can venture further into the mountain range for longer climbing trips such as the guided five-day North Buttress of Sabre, or the overnight climb to Mitre Peak.
While at the Homer Hut, I tried rock climbing and bouldering, which is when you climb around a boulder rather than up a rock wall. I met a climber by the name of Paul Rogers who had put the bolts on some of the rock walls in the 1980s, a pioneering feat which would have taken a lot of work.
Here’s a photo of myself enjoying one of those earlier trips.
Maree and I went on up the Gertrude Saddle, which is quite a hard walk through the valley and up steep rock slabs and boulders. It’s about a five-hour or seven-kilometre return trip all told and, of course, when you reach the top in fine weather, you do get a beautiful view both ways.
On the way up, we met a group of young native Americans who had brought an American flag with them to take photos with, a flag they said symbolised the Iroquois nation, not the USA. It wasn’t a conventional view of the flag, so they taught us a few things.
As we climbed up, it became slippery and icy and I slipped and fell on my kneecap. It was not an easy hike and, when I think about it, I was lucky not to have broken my kneecap. The American boys helped me up to the top, and I got a photo taken with them and their flag. They were a little bit coy at first and asked, ‘Do you mind having a photo taken under the US flag?’ But I didn’t mind at all.
I love Homer Hut and the Gertrude Valley, and have been out there more than half a dozen times now. A few years ago I got the wrong date for an ice climbing weekend. I had read that an Ice Climbing Festival was on 10–18 July, but I was stressed out about something and got muddled, turning up on the 20th.
The trip wasn’t a total washout, though, because I ended up spending the night in a deserted Homer Hut by myself. It was fantastic. The hut was full of wood and coal, so I had a blazing fire and there was a full moon out as well. I really enjoyed myself.
I love to go down with snow tyres on my four-wheel drive, so I can drive over the snow to the hut. It really is beautiful in winter and I do need to make a return visit soon.
To prepare myself for places like this, I have done a bit of rock climbing outside of Queenstown in a place called Gorge Road, and also at Wye Creek, about twenty minutes’ drive from Queenstown. That spectacular spot offers beautiful views of the Queenstown area. There is also a walking track near Wye Creek where people take their dogs and then go climbing.
Though I would not call myself a serious rock climber, I love freedom climbing with my pack and I’ve navigated some quite dangerous areas while up in the mountains. I think women generally underestimate their abilities as to what they can do. Still, I’m just a beginner compared to some other people.
Here is the New Zealand Department of Conservation (DOC) page on the Gertrude Saddle. DOC also emphasises the hazardous qualities of the saddle, and the page includes a safety handout. A 2018 Wilderness Magazine story describes how a couple of people had fallen to their deaths over bluffs lately, after taking wrong turnings on descent.
If you liked this post, check out my book about the South Island! It’s available for purchase from available from my website a-maverick.com.
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