The Cook Valley has long been a near-mythical place, with no tracks, no huts and no helicopter landings. Different in my mind somehow from the tall, gleaming Mt Cook that any of our millions of tourists can see from the comfort of their car, the river that bears the same name and drains to the west coast is shrouded in mist, scrub and mystery. Its aura is brought in to sharp relief by the tale of Ruth Adams, a climber who fell while attempting La Perouse in 1948 with Sir Edmund Hillary, guided by Harry Ayres and Mick Sullivan. This accident precipitated the ‘most arduous rescue operation in the history of the Southern Alps'. Needing dozens of men to cut a track up the notorious gorge and requiring many days on a stretcher to get her out, it has cemented itself in NZ backcountry lore as a lesson in the trials of meddling with the wild West Coast.
Gazing at the computer screen, with Greg waiting on the phone and this knowledge of the Cook running through my mind, the tipping point was a photo of the majestic La Perouse he had just sent through. I'd blown it up to full screen so I could see every detail. The glacial outwash plain of the Cook Glacier with the Balfour Range thrusting up to the north, with even that impressive feature dominated by the main divide at the head, and the bulky shoulders of La Perouse looming from the east. Huge boulders, tangled scrub, and the sun shining on one of New Zealand's most remote corners. It was tantalizing.
We had a top-notch team on board: Greg, Willie, Emil plus West Coast legend Nigel Jordan and hugely experienced mountaineer Peter Cammell. The window was any time
