This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
After dropping the Medium Trip at Chau we sped south, “down ‘to the Panatewaewae roadend, in the Avis rental van, A picnickers* shelter just before the Ranger's residence ' Looked promising, so we took shelter within for the. night . Early Saturday morning and we roamed up to the car park lat the roadend. With the two F.£.'s, Martin Thrupp and Anthony Holland in the lead, we splashed up the. Panatewaewae. At the confluence of the Panatewaewae and a small stream off the Waitewdewae Ridge, the F.E.'s continued up the Panatewaewae while we bashed up a spur, through ponga, pigfern and lawyer onto the top of the ridge leading along to. Waitewaewae- Peak. - On the ridge we grovelled over fallen tree trunks and through supple jack before dropping off into the headwaters Of Prout Stream. * ‘Prout Stream flows down into the West - , Waitewaewae and is‘named:-after Ron Prout, a Tararua tramper ‘who was injuréd-in the Stream some years back after falling over a waterfall. ‘Lunch I ‘in ‘the Upper” Prout and then.it was on down stream. - Travel was: good despite a couple. of swims and several =: “waterfalls, ‘and we’ reached Island Forks in good time. We. saw a dead goat halfway: down the Preut, and further on Jack saw twa live ones. “Fe Island Forks, where Prout Stream joins the West } , Waitewaewae, we decided to go for a stroll down to the I ' confluence of the West and East Waitewaewae Rivers. Having returned from the East Waitewaewae. we were surprised to see the two intrepid F.E.'s Martin and Anthony, come splashing down the Prout, when they should have been in the East — Waitewaewae. The travel had been difficult in the Upper . Panatewaewae so they had decided to give away the East -- Waitewaewae and take our route instead. We headed up into the West Waitewaewae, “looking for a ; campsite. Eventually we found one above the river at The » forks of the West Waitewaewae and a small creek. On Sunday the weather improved substantially. We continued to follow the West Waitewaewae upstream. After an hour or .. S0.we left the river_in the headwaters and climbed up over a low ridge, and then down into the Kaitawa Stream where we had lunch and.a brew. After lunch we raced out down the Kaitawa, reaching the roadend an hour or so later. Those on the trip: Jack McConchie, Jim Robinson, Peter Hodge (scribe and the two F.£F.'s Martin Thrupp and Anthony Holland. ee 2
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