Club Night Report March 2017
Trip Reports
After trying to get to the North Temple basin for several Wednesdays but being put off by wet weather the Wednesday Walkers finally made it near the end of February. A lovely easily accessible alpine basin at the top of Lake Ohau.
24 headed over to Queenstown and Cromwell to bike the trails there in ideal weather, and last week was a walk up Deep Stream beside Lake Aviemore.
The tramping Club had a weekend trip to Dunedin, walking up and along the Maungatuas, followed the next day by a climb up Harbour Cone on the Otago Peninsula and then a walk out to the Pyramids and Victory Beach. Last week was a day walk to Gentle Annie hut in the Horse Range.
Coming Trips
A weekend trip to Aspiring Flats, Glacier Burn and Junction Flat.
A mountain bike ride in the McRaes area with a visit to the Redbank skink enclosure.
The Club is again holding a guided walks day on the three Herbert Forest tracks on the 9 April starting at 10am. Cancelation because of wet weather will be on the NOTMC website on evening of the 7 April.
The Club is starting preparation for the celebration of its 40th Anniversary.
Guest Speakers
Club Members Gail and Tricia shared their Federated Mountain Clubs trip to the West USA National Parks last September October.
They started in the Sequoia National Park with massive Sequoia trees and the odd nosey grizzly bear.
Large areas of trees are dying because of the bark beetle.
Yosemite NP was the highest at 15000 ft. and they did a lot of walks above 9000ft, with a drive through Death Valley at 280ft below sea level, being the lowest.
They had 3 days walking the rim of Grand Canyon, but the amazing shaped rocks of Monument Valley, Arches NP and Goblin Valley with self-explanatory names, were one of the highlights.
Yellowstone NP was the last stop, where they joined some of the 350 million tourists to visit the US National Parks each year, the park being a decidedly larger version of Rotorua’s hot pools and guysers!
Their travels took them from the heat of summer in the south through the autumn colours to an early sprinkling of snow at Yellowstone.
Dunedin Hills
25-26 February 2017
Guess we all go to Dunedin often enough, but don’t usually have time to explore it’s hills. Having members from Dunedin – Helen and Rodney, it seemed a good opportunity to use their local knowledge. With some venturing down on Fri night [for a nice pizza meal] others chose the option of an early start on Sat.
Eventually 13 of us congregated at Outram to head up into Horsehoof Station to make an ascent of Maungatuas via their Woolshed Road (from the north) and with a key key to their locked gate. With a party doing a longer route and one a shorter – we met by the aerials. Then the harder work began though thick scrub to a solitary rocky outcrop, then onto the Trig point at 895 m taking almost 3 hours. Views from the Kakanuis, Hawkduns, Strath Taieri, and south into Southland’s Blue Mountains.
After locating a pretty tarn, we ventured back down, having plenty of time to ready ourselves for a pleasant Thai meal in town.
Next morning the day dawned bright and sunny for us to venture out onto The Peninsula. A couple of differing routes took us up the summit of Harbour Cone, with a 3rd route taken by some to descend. What amazing 360 views!!
Travelling on NE-wards we had quite a trek to the Pyramids, onto Victory Beach and Okia Reserve,
being fortunate enough to have low tide so that we could see 156 year-old steamer wheel in the surf of the SS Victory ship that sunk off the shores on the pristine beach in 1861 .
Great to meet up with and be guided by the very informative Rodney and Helen, plus to have Tim and Betty and Ann from the Taieri, and N.O-iItes Roz, Chris, Mike, Ross, John, Karyl, and Jenni. We will so more exploring of Dunedin’s gems. Jane G
Gentle Annie Hut
Gentle Annie Hut
5th March 2017
Two vehicles left Oamaru and three vehicles arrived at Mt Stalker station yards. Jane M hopped in and we continued up to the end of Tulliemet Road to the “T intersection”. From here, it was easy to see the route for the day and nine of us began our descent into the gully via an old 4WD track. As we continued down towards the Gentle Annie Hut, Jane found some berry laden Coprosma. Some Herefords were keen to get past us so we let them through. We reached the Gentle Annie Hut late morning so we sat in the sun and had brunch while contemplating going up onto the west ridge to cut down some wilding pines which were a fair size. The ridge was a fair size too so we flagged it. We then, back tracked for 10 minutes and started up the zig zag which is to the south east of Mt Stalker. At the top, the lookout is towards Macraes Flat, Puketapu, Conical Hill etc. From here we walked back to the vehicles via the Otepopo spur 4WD track. Going through the last gate, the same Herefords from the morning, were seeing us on our way. Thanks to those who came along. A short, pleasant outing.
John C, Linda, Colin L, Mark, Stewart G, Jane M, Jac, Roz and Bess
Grampians
29 January 2017
If asked to sum up this trip in one word -it would be ‘windy!’. But with the crazy summer weather we have been having, and that this was the first trip in almost 2 months, I think all 10 of us were just happy to be out in real mountains without rain.
It took a couple of hours to get to the top of the Haka Pass after picking up Bronwyn, Helen and Rodney and rearranging 4 cars into 2 at Duntroon. Boots on and we were on our way -all up for 2 ½ hours of steady climbing up 1000 odd meters to 1921m near Black Rocks. Some of us spied the rear ‘black daisy’ and Bronwyn many other species she could name.
Lunch was had with our back to the marvelous view of 7 [imaging one could see Middleton] but shelter was essential. Photos were taken, but I found it difficult to hold the camera steady.
With the wind increasing in intensity, we carefully braced ourselves to maintain our standing during the first section of our descent. After that it was all down at various speeds, averaging about 1 ¾ hours. Replenishing our bodies, those with mathematical/accounting skills were delegated to work out the complexities of the petrol. These 2 functions were completed at Kurow in a pleasant 29 degrees.
8 of the 10 had not been up the Grampians, and by the pain in my quads. a couple of days, it was obvious some had not been up 1000m recently!
Thanks for the company of Jim, Colin, Maurice, Phyllis, John, Bronwyn, Neville, Helen and Rodney. Jane G.
End of Year Dinner 2016
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