This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
Easy Medium Tramp - March 7 to 9 by Simone Musin
Amazing this weekend had 4 tramps going to the same area — E, EM, M, and F. It was fun having 3 vans leaving the railway station for the same area and of course for Featherston for the dinner stop. Then from Featherston a little bit of navigation was required but it ends up several roads go towards Lake Ferry Rd/Cape Palliser and from there it’s along the coast to the Putangirua Scenic Reserve to camp for the night. I was quite surprised to find I could have been in my sleeping bag by 9:30pm so didn’t rush to go straight to bed and had a chance to admire the stars above and there were heaps of them too!
Next morning the E, and us all headed out at around 9am to drive to the road end where the Mangatoetoe Stream comes out.
Basically it was tramping up the Stream to the Mangatoetoe Hut where the E’s would stay and there was debate as to whether the E’s or us EM’s would get there first. We were nice to let the E’s arrive first. We headed out at about 9:30am and arrived at the Mangatoetoe hut by 10:30am for our second breakfast. Then it was on toward Kawakawa Hut along a track. The track wasn’t completely there — most of the time it was just going up the river and then a spur into the bush. The bush was nice but along the whole way there seemed to be a continuous trail of cow poo (to put it nicely — there are many other words to call this!). This also meant that the cows were doing the maintenance of the track for us through the bush — thank you cows. But where were all these cows that added to the environment we were in!
Finally I heard the punters at the front did spot 3 cows but still I believe more cows had to be around considering how much poo was around.
We continued and stopped for lunch or third breakfast break at 12:30ish. We found a reasonable clearing in the bush which was nice. Then it was off again sometimes catching a great view from the top of the spur when trees didn’t block it. The spur was about 300m height. Then it was down the spur over some more streams and out onto the main river again. Then up to the right of the river to Kawakawa Hut. Being the EM’s we were told that the E’s might take our hut or even the M’s would come from the other direction. Feeling slightly pushed by both the E and M’s (Do EM'’s always need to defend their position with both E and M’s?) to get to the hut first we found out it was currently occupied by hunters with their 4 wheel drive vehicle. So in the end we camped out among the trees and grassy clearing areas. Of course needing to move some poo to put up the large fly but Sam had the trusty poo shovel to do the job. It was noted it was better to have cow poo around rather than dog poo so we considered ourselves lucky!
We had a great camp site — being in the trees was great as it reduced the wind factor on the flies and it was nice camping beside the river. Also once we arrived — well before 5pm — I think it was around 4ish we then had our 4" breakfast or pre-dinner snack of cheese, crackers and olive tapenade. This was the start to a gourmet meal and some punters were saying all it needed was a glass of chardonnay to top it off! Then onto main course of dinner which was vegetable orzo pasta with parmesan cheese. Then the dessert which was the best dessert I have ever had on a tramp. Fruit and chocolate fondue! We made our fondue sticks from wood around and then everyone was into it. Just a tip for anyone wanting to do this on other tramps - you must use 2 cooking vessels putting water in the larger one then chocolate into the smaller one that sits in the boiling water. It was just the right amount of chocolate as you can only take so much of chocolate in one sitting. But it was all finished even the bowl got licked!
The next day we were still up early enough to leave by Yish and finally viewing that herd of cows as we were walking out. I knew they had to be around somewhere — it was surprising to not hear any mooing in the forest and still hear lots of bird sounds. We stopped to have the second breakfast at about 10ish then out by exactly 11:25am. The river from the hut out to Palliser Bay was so easy — pretty much a 4 wheel drive track — 1 guess those hunters had to get their 4 wheel drive vehicle in some how. We just slowly ambled along it. So once out at Palliser Bay it was “what do we do now?” the M’s weren't coming out till 3pm and the E’s were going to wait for them and then they were all to come and pick us up on the drive out from Mangatoetoe Stream road end. So we had over 3 hours to kill. We first decided to move down to the beach area and someone started the third breakfast, which caused a chain reaction for everyone else to follow. Even causing some of us to just continue eating even though not hungry for lunch yet. We had to keep ourselves entertained — what do trampers do when they finish the tramp over 3 hours too early?? We had to do with what we had so made a kite from one of our groundsheets, played 500, found a spare tire so had tire rolling competition, and was even entertained by some stick juggling. I am sure that won't happen again — I would recommend a different route that goes a bit further especially for an EM tramp. But what a great area — the club should go back to the area again as it is nice coming out to the coast line at the end of a tramp.
Punters: Bronwyn Bell, Craig Bellhouse, Sam Buckley, Mike Lightbourne, Anita Su’a, Mark White, Donna Maher, Simone Musin
Chocolate fondue in the making