The Milford Track was close to fully booked well within half an hour of opening for the upcoming Great Walks season.
Milford Track. Photo:
The iconic Fiordland track was the first of the Great Walks to open for bookings with the rest opening over the next few days.
The Great Walks season runs between late October and the end of April.
DOC bookings service manager Ross Shearer said it had predicted a high level of demand and initial observations showed it.
"The track was close to fully booked, aside from some ongoing cancellations and bookings changes, well within the first 30 minutes of opening.
"DOC's booking service coped well with the high volume of bookings over a short period of time."
Nearly two hours after opening, there were only sporadic bookings left with no huts dates recording more than eight available spaces on any given day.
Last year, it took just 15 minutes for accommodation on the Milford Track to fill up for the entire season.
"We'll have a full breakdown of how Milford bookings went once the data has been compiled - around midday tomorrow," Shearer said.
Last year, DOC created a myth-busting blog post about how the Great Walks bookings work.