This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
a story Abert eight happy eer who decided that Easter: et or gluttonising chocolate and getting nasty spots on your was for undertaking strenuous trips in Northwest Nelson ng exactly the same things: gluttonising chocolate and getting sty.spots. So we surged across on the ferry,. drove through the witghty: and lay to rest on the spacicus and palatial veranda of the: tueka Kindergarten, a sk clad WTMC campsite. Rue ‘ala ode ‘at -home on our first: morning. Paul's eyes turned misty Bot! inking about the.Tararuas. It was pouring with rain and blowing a Gale. And his eyes wern't misty - his glasses had fogged up. Maybe - » a6; aeruel ~joke.-_Maybe this was the Tararuas. This thought made Eran dia} ely give up any hope’ of doing anything too. ambitious, so we Moet in ‘the wrong direction looking for a nice warm hut. But fate playea another cruel trick and the rain miraculously stopped “so we slogged uphill toward Mt. Arthur. It was almost windy enough ito biow Andrew's camera tripod away, but rortunately the wind ‘couldn't work. out. why anyone would want a tripod on a tramping trip and. so'ignored it. .Exhausted, battered and wind blown we staggered into Ellis Basin at nightfall. Paul missed out on a bunk, but when I
Cy ré party leader and have a bad back ( very: believable} you can rc
always forcefully take someone else's. The previous day had been so revolting we immediately chose to do it again. So we spent another day being blown off the tops and through Balaclavas and parkas comments about how nice the Tararuas actually arem started to be heard. To squash these rebellious tendencies. our vet party was marched away from the hut to a rock bivvy to toughen us “up a bit. However, around Mt. Arthur that isn’t much use. All the rock sPyuses there are luxury accommodation and include mattresses, bunks and seats. how 7am Since this was no way to impose aiscipline, Paul ordered everyone up at dawn for a forced caving trip. ‘Two go up and five went back to sleep. Apparently the only reason that Mark got up was a pathetic effort to chat up the..women in Salisbury Lodge on the way. So three of us ended up caving with our tour guide showing us stalagmites and the _ other funny word that means they grow the other way. Graffitti on them went back to the 1880's. Next stop was a proper cave. Down on hands and knees grovelling through passages and soon into a pool of water, with just a headspace between water and roof. My isn't this fun. Scratched and scarred we returned to sunlight.
A romp around the Tablelands included popping heads into another cave to have wetas fall down your neck. Those who hadn't been toughened by our fearless leader staged'a’mutiny at our last campsite and set off up the track SoHE TE for another of these famous rock bivvies. Glen, Mark and Andrew were found the next morning shivering in the frost having discovered that the rock bivvy was occupied. What they hadnt realised was that there was ancther rock bivvy which not only had mattresses but a hut attached, a further hundred metres up the track. We were very sympathetic, roe As we came close to the road end Chris o>1iffed the air and decided-he needed a wash. The-ensuing howls of. agony from- the “icy water” provoked riotous laughter. The juke was shared by a number of day walkers . was were AEE EAT bath coer cy cur al. tap # fogs Es ' coer 3 : wal, wr : = c 4 * . bd 7 : 7 a When We, akrdired' bathe in Motueka, Harry announced that he had deciddd to take.a ‘week off and head to Abel Tasman. .-Rumour has it that he ‘was cdénsidering rifling ‘A certain pack that a certain person, not ehetrely ial aaa acon iae ve ¥ me had left at Totaranui. , ; And finally the highlight’ of the trip - “getting your pack off the ferry. These days efficiency has been improved.. This means that yb no' jtonger even get to” see which™ truck your pack went on to. Upon arriving: you are faced: with about S*trucks full of. luggage; 2,000-lost- people and notva single’ Railways employee. Chaos.of this magnitude really is work experiencing so let me heartily recomment an Easter trip to ‘the ~ Seuth Island. - After all, often its almost as bad as the Tararuas. Party members: Paul Hughes (fearless Leader}, Glen Curtis, Struan Little, Mark Ogilvie; Mark Randall, Harr ry Smith, Andrew Chisholm, . Christopher I Young.“ ¢ of 8 ets to Reh; : , tte : vis ¥ in 2 : re re ‘s Meanwhile ‘the 28 members cf the Easy/Medium Trip experienced four ® dream-like days—im Abel Tasman National Park; sun and. moon lit ‘days I and nights, without clouds or even a breath of wind to dull the — experience. ‘For''more details, see the Journal later this year.