This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
By Lyndsay Fletcher This was going to be my fifth try at going down Chamberlain Creek. The previous ones failed due to bad weather or cancelled trips. One of these was the scheduled trip last year with Keith Strode-Penny as leader. Well this time it ran and with Keith as leader. Robbie Morrison was the only other member wanting to take on the challenge. Harry Smith did show some interest on the Wednesday prior to the weekend, but as with most of his planning for trips, he wanted to leave his discussion till the Friday. This gives him the chance to observe the weather and as this particular Friday was miserably wet, Harry refused to go. Arriving at Putara roadend, I really did-not feel like climbing up to Herepai Hut. The drive had been hard due to the low cloud on the Rimutaka Hill and the heavy rain but I knew that the weather was due to clear so I headed off into the wet night. The medium party was just getting into their sleeping bags as we arrived at the hut and before long quiet descended upon the hut. The cloud was down to the bush edge as we headed up onto the main range in-the ‘morning: Herepai anc Ruapae were climbed followed by East Peak. The cloud was now thinning and the cold southerly breeze was easing as the three of us gathered to decide on how we were going to drop into Chamberlain Creek. My route would cut out the very head of the creek, thus missing out a lot of thick leatherwood. Keith battled with ethics and suggested doing the whole creek from the saddle between East and West Peaks. My route was the one however and so a fast descent down a long tussock spur soon had us getting close to our objective. At one point a band of knee high leatherwood had to be negotiated. Robbie and I soon got through while Keith had gone down a different way. We then had to witness a hilarious effort by Keith as he decided to take a
short-cut back to us. He first of all jumped into the thickest part of the leatherwood. This was covering a hollow and so he ended up fighting his way through two metre high bushes. He told us that this was fun but he soon changed his mind once he tried to go down towards us. Fifteen minutes later he forced himself out onto the open ridge top that we were on. “Well, that's what real leatherwood is like," he exclaimed to us. It was his first real time at bashing through the stuff.
Just prior to hitting the creek-bed, we all had to bash through a similar belt and at the appearance of the sun, morale and enthusiasm rose. It wasn't long before we reached the first waterfall so out came the 30 metre rope and on went our harnesses. We found the same Totara that seemed to have been used by previous parties. We looped some twine around the trunk that we had brought especially for the job. Robbie was the first to abseil. We had to lower ourselves down alongside the water course which had a 30 degree slope into a pool so the rope proved to be the right length for the job. There was only enough room for two people to stand at the edge of the pool so by the time I was heading down, Keith and Robbie were having their first swim for the day. We were fortunate that there was no wind so we soon warmed up after our ordeal. The travel down the creek was fast and open with a steep gradient but no more waterfalls before lunch. The cloud drifted back after a sunny lunch break and it stayed that way for the rest of the afternoon. We checked our progress down the creek and soon the next waterfall appeared. We were only 400 metres from the junction of the Ruamahanga River and this waterfall was easily abseiled and we did not have to swim. But just around the corner we had to get wet. Within this 400 metre section of river we had a total of 3 waterfalls and 2 swims. The map so rightly shows this by having those gorge markings for this section. Keith was now shaking from the cold, so much in fact, that he did not notice the junction as we headed down the Ruamahanga River.
It was now around 5 o'clock and we decided to head for a spot marked on the map where the river opened out. This was going to be our hopeful campsite. Well, the first pool was soon reached and I sussed out an abseil while Robbie contemplated going for another swim. I think Keith was in favour of my route. I then happened to spot a bush terrace nearby and after a quick trip I announced that our campsite had been found. “Will have to leave that swim till the morning,” I said. Not only did it have room for the smail club fly but a couple of fallen tees too. Our first priority was warmth so a fire was soon roaring. That night the skies cleared and so the next morning we abseiled around the pool. . We could not get warmed up in only 25 metres and 500 metres later we had to swim. The water temperature was freezing compared with the creek so we were glad to finally reach the open after exiting the gorge, having swum a total of 3 pools. The warmth of the sun had us bathing in Herepai Stream during our lunch break and 2 hours later we were back at the truck happy as Larry at having finally completed the trip. Thank you Keith for leading and Robbie for coming along.