That day I was excited like a kid before a school trip. I had a few short walks planned in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park. The weather in the morning was perfect: sunshine, clear sky, and me—naively convinced it would stay that way. My first stop was the Clay Cliffs, a place that’s completely unassuming and very cleverly hidden away from the main road. To get there, you have to turn off State Highway 8 onto a gravel track that absolutely does not look like an access road to a tourist attraction. Just after the turn, you reach a gate that feels very much like the boundary of private…