A Brew On Ruapehu

[johnboy]

Last Weekend I went south from Hamilton to the Central Plateau and Mt Ruapehu for an Abseiling and Rock Climbing weekend course..

I pitched up early on the Friday evening and decided to climb one of the ridges for a bit of a leg stretch after the drive...

Here is the view from the ridge looking across to Mt Ngauruhoe which is under a heap of cloud... but it gives you a good idea of the terrain the elevation at this point is approx 1700m

The ridge is a chossy broken affair and quite loose a bit like being on top of the Glyders... but no cantilever...

Any how I felt my Milo calling and cracked out the brew kit..

I had a crack at lighting the hexy with a firesteel but to no avail or more to the point it was starting to blow a bit and I was mindful of cracking on the the brew..

With a Bic lighter normal service was resumed...

A wind break was constructed from small lumps of scoria and when the water was warm in went the milo...

I'd found the Hexy in an army surplus store for a bargin price so had stocked up on it the stove is a german issue one I think..

Anyhow after a while and despite the wind on the ridge the milo was ready...

Another shot of the scenery Ngauruhoe with a better view from further up the mountain...

Cheers

John

 

[mark wood]

That's a great place to be! Thanks for the pics.

Can you crumble the hexy blocks so they light with a spark?

 

[andybysea]

That's some fantastic scenery! lighting hexi's with a fire steel,god they are hard enough to light with a lighter(well the ones ive got are) is that the German esbit stove? ive got one of them defo better than the hexi burner(Brit one).

 

[MartinK9]

Great pics, thanks for sharing.

I've lit Hexi blocks with a firesteel by "roughing up" the block first to produce some hexi dust.

 

[andybysea]

Sir, i salute you my humble brain would'nt have thought of that.

 

[gsfgaz]

stunning scenery mate , cheers

 

[gazmc2]

quality pics mate, what a view!!

 

[johnboy]

Great pics, thanks for sharing.

I've lit Hexi blocks with a firesteel by "roughing up" the block first to produce some hexi dust.

Yep that's the method I tried roughing it up after working through the waxy layer and getting a pile of dust. With the wind swirling the dust was getting blown around a fair bit..

The bic cracked it though...

Glad you all liked the photos.... The smell of hexy burning is one of those things to me that 'says' outdoors....

 

[Tallyho]

Hi There John,

Cracking pics there nice 1. Nice to see the old hexy burner there! Aint seen 1 since my uncle came back from the falklands in '82. I can still smell the blocks to this day. My uncle used to bring back loads of blocks from training excercises etc n me n my bro would be off up the fells burning the life outa them. To this day my uncle aint said a word to us even though on more occasions than i can count we put the twisted burnt black burner(once square and shiny) inc zero fuel(formerly two full flat packs and a spare) back in his pack. Ha ha fantastic.

 

[welshwhit]

Great pics! Looks fantastic place to have a brew!

You got to love being in teh mountains!

Drew

 

[naefearjustbeer]

Nice pics!
I have never managed to light hexi with a fire steel. What I do is scrape the hexi to make some dust and put that on a wee bit of cotton wool. Fires up quite easily with a strike of the firesteel.

 

[Mistwalker]

Really nice photos there! That's a heck of a view from up there, I bet it was a good stretch after the drive. Thanks for sharing.

 

[jamie18thmo]

Lovely photos John. Looks like you had a good trip.
Cheers,
J