Trip Reports
Otekaieke Hill – 15 June 2025
Sunday, July 6th, 2025
Seven of us left town, picking one more up on the way, making a party of eight for the day.
After all the crap weather we had had during the week we were all hoping for a nice winter’s day, which the weather gods gave us. We headed up the Waitaki Valley, turning off into Special School Rd past the old Campbell Park School and up into Kenmore Station, to park up by some yards up a farm track.
The plan for the day was going to be to climb Otekaieke Hill, then drop off the south side into Jackson Creek and come back along the Bridle Track. But once we looked at all the water from the rain earlier in the week coming down the Otekaieke River, we knew the Bridle Track would be out. So it was decided to go up Otekaieke Hill and return the same way.
We started off along the Bridle Track until we crossed over Bushy Creek, and then found the 4WD track heading up. The 4WD track was a good track and not too bad an elevation. After about an hour, we found a nice rocky point to have a break and take in some views.
From here it was all up for another 1½ hours until we reached point 1010m, and where we started to get the big views of the snowy peaks of the St Marys Range. At this point, one of our party members who was carrying a bit of an injury stopped there for lunch before heading back down, while the rest of us carried on for another 2km along the main ridge line to be all on Otekaieke Hill by 12.30pm.
We sat there having lunch with grand views of Mt David 1412m, Cone Peak 1563m, Grayson Peak 1660m, Mt Domett 1942m, Little Domett 1860m, and in the distance Kohurau 2009m, and also Dansey Pass Rd, Hakataramea Valley and right down to the coast.
It was such a nice day up there with no wind – it was hard to get going again and come back down. Three members decided to take a different way down, which came back onto the main track further down. The rest of us went back down the same way we came up, hoping to meet up with our member who we left behind.
After about an hour, we met back up with our three members that took a different way down from the top, but we still hadn’t met back up with our other member. We all had radios, so after calling him up we found he had taken a different track down. As we got down a wee bit, we could see the farmer bring the stock off the hill and our other member had caught up with him – so he became a shepherd bringing the sheep down.
Not far from the bottom, we all met up together before coming back down onto the Bridle Track and heading back to the cars.
All up we had hiked about 17km and a 900m climb over 6½ hours, so if we had done the original plan it would have been a bit longer – we might keep that for a summer trip when the days are longer.
Thanks to: Julian, Lynette, David, Lorena, Heather, Geoff and Mary for their company for the day – none of them had ever been up there before.
Thanks also to Kenmore Station for letting us on to their farm.
Neville
Dave’s Track Working Bee – 25 May 2025
Sunday, May 25th, 2025
Four of us turned up for this working bee, three from town, and we meet Robbie down there.
I got permission from Port Blakely to drive up the forestry road to the top end of the track, which saved us the half an hour walk in if we had gone through Trotters Gorge Reserve.
It was mainly the top end of the track that needed the work, with the pigs making a bit of a mess in there.
Most of the morning was spent cutting scrub and remarking, and in some places making a new track through the pig routings back to where you go around under the cliff face.
After lunch, we tackled the gorse further down which had just about blocked the track again, and we carried on down the track having a good trim and remarking.
At about 2pm we called it for the day – not quite getting all the way through, but the track was getting a bit clearer by then, so it may need a walk through in the spring.
Thanks to Robbie, David and Phyllis for your wonderful effort keeping this memorial track named after the late club member Dave Sinclair open for members to use.
Neville
Lake Coleridge Base Camp – 9-11 May 2025
Sunday, May 11th, 2025
Trip Report: Lake Coleridge Base Camp, May 9-11 2025
The first group of four drove through rain and surface flooding for 3.5 hours on Friday afternoon, arriving before dark to start a fire and warm the bach for the next group arriving after work.
With brilliant weather on Saturday morning, we set off at 8am to climb Peak Hill at 1240m. It is an unrelenting climb to the top, taking 1.5 hours, with magnificent views east down the Rakaia to the coast, and west up the Wilberforce, Mathias and Rakaia Rivers to the snow covered Southern Alps. Vast and breathtaking.
Rather than descending the same way, we took the circuit back to the car park. This route takes much longer, following the west ridge down to a fence line. We found orange poles to follow on the route around the hill but had to push through bracken and matagouri.
Then, to make the most of a perfect day, the advance party of five drove around the Lake to the Ryton Track. We followed around the base of Little Mt Ida to Lake Ida, an easy, achievable track in under an hour. Deeply shaded in autumn and winter, Lake Ida used to be popular for skating.
Another clear crisp day on Sunday saw Tizzy taking us on a walking tour of the Village and hydro scheme. Lake Coleridge power station was built in 1910 and powered all of Christchurch in the early days. One group of four then headed home, stopping to walk the 45 minute track to the lookout on the Rakaia Gorge track. (We now want to walk the entire trail!)
The other group stayed on at the bach, taking time to explore further along the Ryton Track to Lake Catherine, an hour on from Lake Ida with wide open views of the Ryton river and the valley leading to the Harper River. Then back to the car for another Tizzy tour, this time to the head of Lake Coleridge and the Harper diversion, then down to the foot of the Lake to finish the day with walking the Lake Hill track, joining up to the Intake Rd just as the sun set over a gleaming, shimmering silvery Lake Coleridge. Absolutely beautiful!
Thank you Tizzy for making Base Camp possible. We look forward to more adventures exploring the hidden rivers, hills and lakes of the Rakaia.
Jenny Kitchin
Rabbiters Peak – 29-30 March 2025
Monday, March 31st, 2025
Four members and 2 extras set out from town at 7 am. We rendezvoused at the Wrinkly Rams for a quick coffee and headed up to the Temple carpark which was quite busy with campers. It was a blue sky day and we had a pleasant walk up the valley, reaching the head of the valley in time for lunch. One of the group decided to stay and camp there for the night while the rest carried on up the steep hill in the general direction of Rabbiters Peak. Good route finding skills by the 2 extras resulted in minimal scrub bashing. Our aim was to find a camping spot at the tarn just below the 1600 contour and explored the ridge beyond that for possibilities to get to the peak by following along the ridge. After about 2 1/2 hours we reached the tarn and set up our tents and after the usual snacks and drinks were had we went to the ridge just there 150m further up to check the likelihood of going that way in the morning. It turned out that this way was not the easiest with some steep rock climbs required with a lot of exposure to bad outcomes should anyone take a tumble.
So we packed up and went down retrieving some of the bits of gear that had blown away during the night as we went. We met up with the lonely camper at the head of the North Temple, even getting him out of bed and after his pack up walked back down the valley to reach the cars just before lunchtime. The day was much more overcast than the previous day and a broody NW promised rain at some point.
This was a short but otherwise very nice trip into out backyard hills. We didn’t reach our objective, but there is always another day. Thanks to Julian, Lorena, Neil, Jonah and Scout for coming .
Robbie
Twilight Walk: Skyline Walkway – 17 March 2025
Monday, March 17th, 2025
Seven of us met at the Oamaru Public Gardens car park at 6pm for a 6.15pm departure. We left the car park and went up Chess St to the start of the Skyline Walkway.
From there we walked west towards Old Mill Rd, looking down on Chelmer St and the Top 10 Holiday Park also with great views of the Kakanui mountains. The track then heads around above Old Mill Rd looking down on the old waterwheel before heading up past the Observatory Retirement Village, which is growing bigger all the time with more land getting developed.
We then crossed over Eden St into the Glen Eden Reserve and followed the track down into the valley below, where we had to decide which bike track would get us up the hill to get over to the Glen Warren Reserve. The track we took zigzagged up the hill until we came to a fence with a paddock on the other side and the bike track that carried on north along the fence line, which was not the direction we wanted to go. So we crossed over the fence and headed up to meet the track from Reservoir Rd on the skyline.
We then followed that track back towards town going through the Glen Warren Reserve, which is a wee bit of native bush above Warren St which hasn’t been looked after for a while, and then dropped steeply down to meet back up with the track that comes through the Glen Eden Reserve.
We then came out onto the bottom of Eden St and went up and over Devon Terrace back towards the Gardens, where we walked through the Chinese Gardens before arriving back at the car pack just before 8pm.
All up, it was about 5km and took us about an hour and ¾ on a calm and warm evening.
Thanks to the ones that showed up and made it an enjoyable night.
Neville
