This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
Medium Tramp - May 11 to 13 by Darren Hammond
I approached this tramp with some trepidation, it being my first Medium trip. Before now, I had attempted nothing harder than Easy/Medium, but having survived some long hard days on those tramps, I figured it was time to step up to the plate... We 8, (and 5 Easy trampers) camped at Kawhatau Base, and had a fairly mild and comfortable night. Next morning, we slogged our way up to Colenso High Point, and on cue, the clouds began to break as we rested at the top. It was quite chilly still, and visibility was fairly poor, so Alistair and Dirk had to call up their navigational skills. Meanwhile, Jon the vegan was finding all manner of interesting flora and fauna to take back to work on Monday to study further. Snow berries, mmmm. The clouds continued to lift, and we were soon able to clearly see the route to the start of the Mokai Patea Range. After lunch, we slogged our way along the plateau, which was hard going because of the spongy ground. We had some good views of the nearby ranges, but we could not see Ruapehu. Sunday's forecast seemed promising though for better views. Just before Rongotea (1568m), we started a hair-raising descent of a razor sharp ridge, down to Crow Hut, where we were to spend the night. The presence of vast amounts of speargrass/spaniard made it even more challenging. We had our own Spaniard on this trip, the very fit Enrique, representing Spain in a much more positive manner than his prickly botanic namesake. At the bottom of the hill, things got interesting for a while, and most people crossed the river twice, before we all ended up the same side we had started, following the marked track to the swingbridge to Crow Hut. I’m not a big fan of these things myself, and the lack of wire netting on the sides did not help. The Easy group had arrived shortly before after a tough 7 hour day. 13 of us in the hut for dinner was a tight squeeze, and pretty cosy! After our gourmet meal of fillet steak (hooray for gourmet tramping), Alistair polled the punters to see who was keen for a bit of extra walking tomorrow, along the Hikurangi range, and down to the Purity Road end. “Once we get up above the ridge, it’s pretty flat’, Alistair told us. Jon the vegan was the only one who saw through this obvious lie.
An early start on Sunday because of the extra walking Alistair had conned us into, and we were away by 7.45, which is pretty absurd when you are used to Easy or Easy- Medium tramping. By the time we were halfway up the 600 metres climb from Crow Hut, the sun had peeked over the hill, and the day was warming nicely after a frosty start. As we started along the Hikurangi Range, it was becoming obvious how poor Alistair’s understanding of the word flat really was. Luckily, the views on this perfect autumn day were simply UNBELIEVABLE, Ruapehu and Tongariro seemed just an arms length away, and even Taranaki was peaking above the distant clouds. From Hikurangi (1714m), we could see the ocean on the East Coast, we truly had 360 degree views. Some of us took the opportunity to call and wish our mums a happy Mothers Day from this beautiful spot. I hope you remembered to do the same. We came across a group coming the other way, they had an Alsatian with them, who was carrying her owners food in a pair of ‘saddle’ bags. An unusual site for sure. We slogged through to Mangaweka (1731m — the highest point in the Ruahines!) for lunch, after that we had Iron Peg (1703m) and Wooden Peg (1672m), before descending quickly to Purity Hut. Then, a last slog through the bush, and down a ridiculously steep descent through farmland to the Purity Road end.
2 long days, but we had covered a lot of ground, and been over some territory that few people would normally cover in a weekend trip. We were all pretty shattered, but satisfied with our weekend's ‘work’.
If you’ve never done a medium, but think you’re up to 8 or 9 hours a day, give it a go, it’s well worth it for the views. Just don’t believe Alistair if he says it's flat!
Punters were: Alistair, Sarah, Murray, Kathryn, Enrique, Dirk, Jon the vegan, (and Matt from the Easy group joined us on the Sunday)