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Rest Day
Today is rest day. After pigging out last night at the Hermitage, we start our rest day slowly and quietly. Unwin hut is very quiet. There are only two other groups in and they leave as soon as they've e packed so we have the place to ourselves. After breakfast we read and doze in the main area of the hut and discuss what we should do for the next week. The weather has been good so far but the prediction is for a front moving in from the west. Nick and John debate numerous alternative plans and we all agree that to waste the good weather would be foolish. We plan to fly to Kelman hut and save two days of walking. With that decision made, Nick books a helicopter for that afternoon and we quickly pack. Surprisingly we're good at this now.
Also with the lessons learned from the walk in and out of Caroline hut, we pack light. Nothing superfluous comes with us.

In the time between booking and leaving we also visit the hermitage again and : wash and dry our clothes, buy souvenirs, sunscreen (no zinc), scarves, ice screws, snow stakes, hire axes, book the hut, find the meat we forgot to take to Caroline hut, bump into Roy at DoC and get the low-down on the area, and even send off a few quick e-mails!!!

The Flight Up
The Helicopter flight to the top of the glacier is fantastic. Our pilot takes us up the Tasman Glacier, close along the eastern side of the valley. Beside us we can see far into canyons that cut deep into the Malte Brun Range. Water falls dropping into dizzying voids, and everywhere, steep, steep scree and rocky bluffs. Below us, the surface of the glacier quickly transforms from the gray rubble of the morain into dirty twisted and broken crevasses of the lower regions and then suddenly smoothes out into a wide, white river of ice and snow, grinding its way down between steep snow covered slopes. Avalanche fans are visible everywhere. Even though we are obviously gaining altitude, huge peaks still tower above us. All too soon I spy a tiny hut perched on a spur of rock above the main body of the ice flow. Shouting into my headset I point it out to Nick and he waves acknowledgment. It turns out to be Tasman hut. Kelman hut is higher still. Too soon, looking up ahead I see another hut. Again tiny, and again, like the last one, impossibly perched on a bleak rampart of broken rock rising above the head of the glacier. It looks more like a toy Monopoly house that's simply been dropped there from above. The pilot signals to us, and swoops in low over the hut and down onto the relativley level ice of the Tasman Saddle. Some people come outside to watch us unload. We are so close to the hut that we could have packed a pool table and steel band !
Oh well ... live and learn...

Following John now, we shoulder our loads and carefully plod up the ice slope, gingerly stepping across small crevasses, to reach the rocky buttress on which the hut is built. Obviously built for more arctic conditions, we find the hut stands proud of the rocks it is built on, and best access is presently by an awkward scramble along the back wall. We scrape and bump along the side of the hut and reach the stairs. It's a little awkward getting on to them but soon we're inside, happily  playing 'campus board' with the locals, on the stairs that go up to the loft.
 

Kelman Hut
The hut itself is the highest hut on the glacier, being just above the Tasman Saddle at about 2400m. Inside there is a large gear room with a small dorm for instructors. Through the gear room into the kitchen finds a well it room with views to the west and south. there is another room off this one with sleeping for at least 10 and upstairs is a loft which sleeps approx. 20. We'd been told on good authority, that a couple of weeks ago the hut housed 43 people during some bad weather. Must have been cozy then ! The four water tanks outside are perilously low in contents and the current occupants mention that fresh water is becoming a concern. The kitchen area used to be fitted with kerosene stoves, but these have since been removed and in their place, the users supply there own cooking apparatus. This makes meal times quite interesting .... Ever tried cooking on a bench with half a dozen MSR like stoves all going at once ?

Our arrival brings the numbers in the hut to 16. We are formally,  the 'Hudson party of 4'. Already in residence are the "AGL TMC of 10" and "Caro's party of 2".
Cozy but not crowded.

Our food stocks were (pardon the pun) beefed up when we left Unwin by the late arrival of the meat that was supposed to have gone up to Caroline Hut for out TMC. In addition to that, a party left as we arrived (using our flight as a back flight), and had a heap of veggies to spare, from which everyone profited.
Nick and I set to work and produced a wonderful, fresh garlic satay'ed beef dish for dinner, and as the evening drew on, we kicked back and played cards into the night.

Tomorrow, for the first time, we venture out onto the ice by our selves.
Tomorrow we intend to climb the face of Mt Aylmer.