This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
Ruahines Medium Tramp - 16 to 18 May by Gareth Morton
The Magnificent Seven departed as usual on Friday post-work for what was a fantastic weather forecast for the time of year; High pressure sitting over the country for a few days with no rain or significant winds forecasted. However, this was the Ruahines which is renowned for its exposed tops and I also had memories of a previous club trip in the Ruahines where we had to crawl on hands and knees at times because of strong winds making it almost impossible to walk normally.
We arrived at the Wakarara Rd end just 4.5hrs after leaving WLG, via a dinner stop in Woodville, thanks to Steve “Schumacher” Austin! We strung up the fly using the van, tree branches and a trekking pole as both large flies had been supplied without poles! The night was not especially cold and we all awoke after a decent nights sleep, and left the van at 8.30am in the sunshine. After an hour of walking along a flat track we came to the confluence of the Makaroro River and Gold Creek where our tramping would really begin with the long slog up Sparrowhawk Spur to the Ruahines Main Range. It was at this point that 1 began to feel slow, heavy and tired for reasons unknown; perhaps because I hadn’t exercised in the previous 2 weeks since completing the Rotorua Marathon, a lack of tramping this year or even the previous nights dinner in Woodville! The plan for the trip was to head up Sparrowhawk Spur to the tops, head north along the ridge and then drop down to Colenso Spur to the Barlow Track and into Barlow Hut for the evening. This had looked like a good Medium trip on the map but was now in reality closely resembling a Fit trip! With dogged determination and a degree of stubbornness I managed to remain only a few minutes behind the others, and was very relieved to get to
Sparrowhawk Biv for lunch approximately 4 hours later and having climbed about 1100 metres. It was 1.15pm when we left the biv and we were all aware that we would need to use headlamps later, as getting to Barlow Hut before dark was unlikely. Very surprisingly there was literally no wind along the Main Range, though there was some light cloud which interrupted the views occasionally. We could see Mt. Ruapehu sticking its head out above its own clouds, plus many other ridges in the Ruahine Ranges.
After some tough undulations along the ridge, and feeling more energized after lunch, we made it to the high point of the trip at 1534mts. We left this point at 4.15pm with daylight soon to disappear so started on the 980 mt drop down to Barlow Hut via Colenso Spur. The spur was easy to follow though involved some steep sections which tested the knees and the effects of ‘jelly legs” were starting to be felt, except by Steve Austin who as we all know has bionic legs! We reached the junction to Barlow track at 5.30pm and could no longer delay the donning of headlamps, not even Steve who also has bionic eyes! The track sign said only 30 minutes to Barlow Hut but in fact took 55 minutes in the dark as the track is very steep in many places and we lost it briefly due to windfall and had to bushbash to find it once again. It was with relief we arrived at an empty Barlow Hut at 6.30pm after a 10 hour day, which was certainly up there with some Fit trips I have done in the past! What was even more amazing was that Eamonn had carried a tent weighing 2.8kg, 2 litres of fresh milk and enough sliced ham to feed a small country! Dmitry had also brought along a full box of sugar cubes — go figure! Dinner was a hard earned and tasty Thai Yellow Curry with tuna, veges and rice with caramel cake and custard for dessert.
Sunday morning we awoke to a good layer of ground frost as the hut is situated in a valley that doesn’t get the sun until late, so we were grateful for the comfort of the hut and its old cast iron wood stove. Surprisingly, no one had stayed at Barlow Hut for the previous 3 weeks even though it is only 3 hours up river from the roadend.
Although we had the option of heading up a small unknown track to Parks Peak Ridge allegedly maintained by the Heretaunga Tramping Club, everyone was happy to have an Easy day after the previous days Fit tramp. We headed down the Makaroro River for 3 hours and approx 25 (mostly straight-forward) river crossings to the road end. The sun was shining brightly once it appeared over the ridges and was a wonderful end to a good tramp with good company. The drive back to WLG went smoothly with Eamonn’s milk addiction being quenched in Dannevirke and also affecting Hans who jumped on the calcium bandwagon, plus a stop in Greytown’s “Schoc” outlet for 1.5kg blocks of chocolate! — -
Punters: Gareth, Eamonn and Steve as co-leaders plus Kevin, Dmitry, Hans and Mika.
The two photos under the title were taken by Eamonn Flood. The photo on the left was by Dmitry Yalkhimov.