Hotels near Kepler Track, Te Anau

We water taxied to the trail head and hiked to the Luxmore Hut. Out and back this took us about 4.5 miles roundtrip. We got back to the water taxi an hour before it was due to arrive, so we decided to walk back to town. The walk around the lake took 2.5 hours. We were really tired but felt great to accomplish. We logged 21 miles that day as our accommodations were about 1.5 miles from town and we were totally on foot for the day.

We visited in late December. Loved the scenery along the track but the “walk” was somewhat challenging during the climb and descend (my poor old knees!) and the weather was quite cold and windy for some of the hike.

This is one of the best Great Walks we did. The section between the Iris Burn Hut and the Hanging Valley Shelter (the section along the ridge) has some of the best scenery we saw in New Zealand. We did the section twice instead of doing the entire walk :-)

Spectacular mountain scenery and beautiful forests. I hiked the trail in reverse direction to the usual, and found it easier than if I had gone the other way. Track of a high standard equal to the Milford Track and better maintained than the Routeburn. Excellent huts and wardens.

The best great walk I have done. The first day was a nice, easy walk through a thick forest, very laid back. The second day (over the mountain tops/ridges) was absolutely stunning, definitely the best section of the track. 100% reccomend walking up to the top of Mt Luxmore for some amazing views. Also highly suggest visiting the Luxmore caves. Don't be scared to go past the 'end' of the caves. I squeezed through some extremely small gaps into some secret areas and they were spectacular. The third day of walking is similar to the first, definitely overshadowed by the 2nd day.

I took the water taxi to the bay start of the Kepler track. I made it up to the clearing in between the times given. Fantastic views. The last third is the roughest or rather steepest. Slow and steady worked well.