In Arrowtown’s isolation you’re seldom alone

"Getting away from it all" suggests a rest from people. In Arrowtown, though, things can get up close and personal.

At the risk of sounding down-home, Sawpit Gully Trail starts behind the Arrowtown shops. Glamorously, though, Arrowtown actually backs on to a huge chunk of publicly accessible, protected land, thanks to Mutt Lange and his amazing actions conserving the farmland he bought.

Macetown Rd starts here too. When built in the 1920s it bowled straight through an old gold mining settlement. Fair enough. Less than 60 years after the gold rush people were possibly pleased to see the back of it all. Now, 100 years post-road-building, we are carefully conserving the settlement’s remains. Track walkers can visit this active archaeological site within the first few minutes of starting the trail.

Going anticlockwise, the first half-hour or so is wall to wall introduced plants. Conifers and sycamores are another legacy of gold mining days. Deciduous trees create a shady coolness in summer, a golden cathedral in autumn or a winter treat when absent leaves let the sun shine through.

At the big map go left. It’s time to climb. Very soon regenerating beech forest is winning the battle with the pest plants. Yay, the first tussock!

Arrowtown is already high altitude so quite quickly the track heads towards the tops. Unlike us, a creek’s got more sense and is easing its way downhill. This does mean creek bed for walkers to navigate, but also the delightful sound of moving water.

Like the local roads, the track is winding and tight. In places it’s up a gorge, in others it edges along steep hillsides. Corners can mean surprise close encounters, with strangers, of the physical kind, or overhearing observations normally kept private — "it’s easy to get laid but hard to find a good relationship". Heard just before coming face to face with the person. Frozen grimaces, shy chuckles.

We’re all human. We’re all fundamentally fragile. Emotional security calls. The supposed cocoon of coupledom.

Since the mid 1800s and the development of romanticism we’ve placed our hopes for happiness largely at the feet of life partnerships. This is a big ask; marriage was historically a more emotionally moderate arrangement.

Even if we do find true love it may not be secure. Death does us part. Soul death can come sooner. Behind closed doors can be a silent, resentfully turned ramrod of a back.

Thankfully though, although we may be wired for connection there’s more to life than just one primary attachment. Commitments based on hormones and hope don’t always last. Spirituality does, along with whānau, both biological and chosen. So does community and loving friendship. Hilltop expansiveness lasts longer than any of it.

Alas though, here the past planting of conifers has had long lasting effects that bite us with seriously sharpened teeth in both buttocks. Conifers were introduced for good reason but they took off and took over.

But people are nailing the problem. Great tracts of wilding pines have been sprayed by helicopter and individual trees dealt to by hand. Hillsides of dead conifers and pockets of freshly planted, locally adapted native trees bode well for the future.

The creek peters out, disappearing into a cleft at the top of a hill. Plane noises hint at what’s over the brow, a surprise view of Lake Hayes guiding the eye in the direction of Queenstown International Airport.

A tussocky flat allows for a high-country kip. Then there’s a steep shingly descent back to civilisation.