Distance: 2.6 km (1.0 DOC hours) - Benched track - Easy-moderate terrain
Altitude: 628m to 731m. Gain: 107m. Loss: 64m . Gradient: 4 deg (Moderate)
Skills: - Occasional rivers (3/6)

Benched track (3/9)
Benched, maintained, marked tramping track or pack-track

Primary, mapped (1/5)
Formal route, on maps, principal access to hut or along range / catchment

Moderate (difficulty: 3/5)
Occasional moderate climbs

Easy-moderate (difficulty: 2/5)
Tussock / river-gravel / open bush / cut track

None (difficulty: 1/7)
No alpine skills required

Occasional rivers (difficulty: 3/6)
Occasional rivers - impassible after heavy rain

Unknown (difficulty: 0/7)
Not specified

From Pool Hut, cut NE dropping to the riverbed. The zigzag 4wd track climbing the eastern escarpment of The Peninsula is clearly visible across the river. The Waiau is generally fordable at this point (slow and knee-thigh deep after a day of moderate snow-melt).

Follow the farm track onto the terrace between the Waiau and Stanley, and follow the flats upriver. The 4wd track cuts back down onto the valley floor about 100m from the end of the terraces (not half-way as shown on 2019 topo maps). At the base of the descent the farm track joins the poled DOC track from The Racecourse to Stanley Vale. The junction is not signposted.

Note: Described in the reverse direction to your journey

The old farm track climbs onto the broad terraces of The Peninsula at upriver end in the Stanley valley (not lower down as indicated by topomaps). Once on the broad terraces follow them SW to the escarpment above the Waiau, and pick up the zig-zag 4wd track which drops the face to the river below.

The Waiau is generally fordable at this point (slow and knee-thigh deep after a day of moderate snow-melt). Pool Hut can be reached by climbing two scrubby escarpments to terraces on the eastern bank, where the St James Cycleway can be intercepted.

The historic Bridge Hut is 300m south on a lower terrace and is dilapidated an unfit for use (2019)