This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
holiday in the South Island in need of some well-deserved rest. This was not to eventuate. Not only was I due to start work the following day but I was also to lead a trip into the Tararuas the next weekend (Wellington Anniversary weekend). What complicated matters was that a late change of route was necessary as the bus needed to be at the Holdsworth roadend on the Monday. Nevertheless, I managed to organise everything in the short timeframe and on Friday night we boarded the Club bus and headed off to the Tararuas.
I arrived back home after 3 weeks’
The group comprised Andy Sweet, Austin, Sally Hobson, Peter Yarlett, Laura Tomlinson, Lisa Tinkley, Heather McCaully, Toni McKnight and Ray Walker. If we had followed our original scheduled route we would have started at Putara, and returned there via Herepai, Dundas, and Cattle Ridge. This would have been a fairly straightforward trip for an Easy/Medium group. But as we now had to be at the Holdsworth roadend on Monday afternoon, the tramp would be more challenging. We arrived at Putara just after 8.30pm and were soon ready to start out. I had decided beforehand that it would be prudent to tramp in as far as Roaring Stag Lodge on the Friday night as not to do so could result in being late out on Monday. (In retrospect this was a good decision.) Although it was still light when we started out from the bus, it became dark very soon after entering the bush. I had estimated that it would take under 3 hours to reach Roaring Stag Lodge but due to the fact that we were tramping in the dark ona rather muddy track, it would be four hours before we reached the first night’s destination. The light coming from some of our torches faded as we progressed along the track and by the time we reached the hut a number of people were sharing their available torchlight. It was about 12.45am when we reached Roaring Stag Lodge. I’m sure that the word “lodge” had conjured up all sorts of ideas in the minds of some the party members. The body language of one or two people indicated a degree of disappointment when they discovered the “lodge” was in fact an old Forest Service hut which was in less than pristine condition. There was one person already in the hut. He was a hunter, and after talking to him for at least 30 seconds I made up my mind that this guy was just a little bit “different”. “The hut is full of lice,” he warned us. “I’ve poured some petrol into my sleeping bag to keep them away!” I didn’t think that petrol would do his sleeping bag much good but the prospect of having lice crawling around inside our sleeping bags wasn’t very comforting. Nevertheless, everybody stayed inside the hut and to my knowledge nobody in our group was attacked by lice. The next day we took the liberty of sleeping in till 9.00am. I felt this was justified by the fact that we had gone to bed at about 1.00am. We were ready to set out some time after 10.00am. The intention was to tramp to Cow Creek Hut that day either via Cattle Ridge or by travelling down the Ruamahanga River. The river route would be quicker but would not provide the views we could expect by taking the route along Cattle Ridge. I could see that there was a lot of wind on the tops. The clouds were racing across the sky at great speed. The two options were discussed by the party and, due to the fact that the wind speed seemed excessive, it was agreed that we would take the river route to Cow Creek.
We set off down the river and before long it became apparent that this route wasn’t going to be too easy. In order to avoid deep pools in the river it was necessary to scramble up the bank and bush-bash our way around bends in the river. Then the inevitable happened. The sound of a scream alerted me to the possibility that someone had come to grief. After retracing my steps along the river bank, my suspicions were confirmed. Lisa had fallen from the bank after the edge gave way. She had taken a rather nasty fall and had cut her knee quite badly on a rock. The first aid kit was soon open and Andy was attending to Lisa’s wound. Although quite shaken by the experience, Lisa was still able to walk without too much difficulty once her knee was properly bandaged.
After a short discussion about the feasibility of continuing down the same route, it was decided that it would be better if we took the route over Cattle Ridge instead. The wind on the tops appeared to have abated. So we retraced our steps back up the river and started the climb towards Cattle Ridge Hut. I was concerned about how Lisa would cope with her injury and was working out in my mind a contingency plan which I would discuss with the others once we got to the hut. As we continued up the track I noticed that other people in the group were struggling with the climb and due to this, I thought about the possibility of spending Saturday night in Cattle Ridge Hut. It took some time before everyone reached the hut. It soon became apparent that about half the group was totally exhausted, and thus it was becoming more probable that we would spend the night at this hut. The consensus was that we should stay there the night and have an early start the next day. And so the decision was made.
The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing in and around the hut. I went up onto the ridge with my map and compass and spent some time identifying the peaks on Dundas Ridge. I had been on a trip along this ridge last year with a group which was led by Ruth Parnell. I recalled that the route was not very distinct and that there was some potential for going down the wrong spur before getting to the spur leading to Cow Saddle. I identified Mount Bannister and thought that this might be a good point to take a bearing from to confirm the turnoff to Cow Saddle the foilowing day. (Assuming of course that the visibility was good.) Andy had another look at Lisa’s knee. This time he wore a pair of rubber gloves he found in the first aid kit. He really looked the part now and soon gained the nickname “Doctor Bob”. Dinner soon followed. A number of people in the party had mentioned that they had “dicky” knees. I had a quick count of people with this affliction and it transpired that six out the nine people had this problem! The menu was the good old Maggi Chicken and Apricot mix recipe. Sally mentioned that she had had this meal on her previous eight tramping trips. I guess this is a rather popular meal. i must look at an alternative for my next trip. With the prospect of an early start the next day, everybody had an early night. I must admit it was a little unusual to be going to bed when it was still light. My sleep was interrupted at 6.00am by the distinctive beeping of my Casio watch alarm. For the benefit of the others I let it continue for its full twenty beeps. It looked like it was going to be a nice day. Setting off soon after 7.30am, hardly a cloud was visible as we moved up onto the ridge. I still had a contingency plan in mind. If Lisa’s knee got worse we could come out at Kiriwhakapapa or The Pines instead of going all the way to Holdsworth. However, she was confident that her knee would be okay. It was going to be a long day. We needed to go all the way to Mitre Flats in order to comfortably reach the roadend by 4.00pm on Monday. The route along the tops was reasonably easygoing except for one rather sharp dip. The weather was good and we had great views out over the Wairarapa, and Dundas Ridge in the other direction.
1 was paying careful attention to the map as I didn’t want to go down the wrong spur. We finally came to a metal post which I strongly suspected to be the turnoff. I couldn’t actually remember this from my previous trip along this ridge. 1 took compass bearings off Mount Bannister and what I suspected to be Waingawa peak. These readings tied up nicely. After having a rest and munching on scroggin, we started off down the spur towards Cow Saddle. We met a couple of groups of people heading up the track. One of these groups had travelled down the river from Roaring Stag to Cow Creek the previous day. They had been in the river up to chest height at times and had had some difficulty in finding the track from the river to Cow Saddle.
We continued down the track to the bush-line and then to Cow Saddle. We had a rest at the saddle before continuing on down to Cow Creek Hut. It was a beautiful day and we decided to have our lunch by the river a little upstream from the hut. The stream looked very inviting, so much so that two or three of us hada swim. Meanwhile, I consulted my copy of Tararua Footprints to see what it said about the track from Cow Creek to Mitre Flats. The book indicated that it would be about half an hour quicker to go down the river rather than following the track. I put this option to the group and they were all in favour of going down the river. The book also indicated that it should take about three hours to cover the distance. However, I was a little sceptical about this as thus far we had taken somewhat longer to cover the route than the book had indicated.
After putting on more sunscreen we set off down the riverbed towards Mitre Flats. Progress appeared to be fairly slow due to the number of river crossings involved. However, I! knew it would still be quicker than going on the track which at times climbed quite high above the river. As expected, it was a long day. The route was very scenic and the weather was perfect for a “river bash”. { could tell that some of the group were getting pretty tired. The question: “How long is it to Mitre Flats now?” seemed to come up at regular intervals. My responses became more non-committal. At last I saw the foot bridge over the river at the top end of Mitre Flats. Knowing that the hut was now only about half a kilometre away I turned and said jokingly to some of the others, “Only about 10km to go now!”. This did not go down too well!
Mitre Flats Hut was indeed a welcome sight as we had left Cattle Ridge hut nearly twelve hours earlier. During the night the wind came up markedly and in the morning most of the socks which had been hung out on the veranda were now scattered all over the adjacent field. Luckily all these were recovered.
The final day’s tramp involved getting to the roadend at Holdsworth via Atiwhataku Saddle. I had not been on the track between Mitre Flats and Atiwhataku Hut before and therefore was not certain exactly how long it would take us. We started out at about 8.30am. Except for some subsidence near one of the streams, the track to the saddle turned out to be quite straightforward. Sally’s knee was starting to be a bit of a problem so I lent her my walking pole and said reassuringly, “It’ll be all downhill soon”. Being one of the minority on this trip who didn’t have a “dicky” knee, I didn’t realise that the most difficult grade for bad knee sufferers was downhill. The weather all weekend had been fine. As we travelled down from the saddle to Atiwhakatu Hut a light sprinkling of rain caused some of us to don our parkas but they were soon to be taken off again as this drizzle dissipated. We had lunch at Atiwhakatu Hut before completing the final walk to the roadend.
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Trip Reports
Kay Walker
Trip Reports