Benmore Dam to Sailors Cutting
28th June 2026
Three cars arrived shortly after 9am at the Benmore Dam carpark and everyone was keen to get going. We got warmed up walking the Benmore Peninsula Track and at the Lookout, met a chilling westerly however it was a sunny day. It is a stunning vista looking over Lake Benmore and up towards the Haldon Arm where at the north end is Haldon Station. At the start, 3 people had decided to do a there and back walk so were to drive the vehicles around to Sailors Cutting to pick up the rest of the group. So, further along the A20 the Sailors Cutting group stopped at 12.30 for lunch in a sheltered spot just before the picnic bench on the knob. After lunch the breeze had dissipated, and it warmed considerably. We reached Sailors Cutting about 3pm. Perfect timing as the other 3 had just finished their walk along the A20 and back to the vehicles. They came and picked us up and on the way home, stopped at Kurow for an ice cream.
Thanks for your company, Anna, Tania, Charley, David, Lorena, John, Karyl, Ros and Jenny, Photos from David and John.
Trip Report, Kings Birthday, 2026
Herbert Forest, Wainakarua Reserve Circuit
This is a first-time trip for this club, where we have tended to spend time in both but separately. It is a trip for lovers of long ups and long downs, also a trip very close to home and as it turned out quite doable.
Three such lovers of long ups and long downs set out from Goblin Woods on Saturday morning about 9.00am and donned our packs right from home for me and headed up the road to the Swallows Track which was quickly completed. Minor scrambling to get us past the logging activities and we walked up the Middleridge Rd until we got to Mt Misery Rd and a further few hundred meters saw us on the DoC track leading down hill to the Middle Branch where we found the rocky spot before you head up the hill to Tabletop for lunch and heard the call of the Karearea. Up the rather brutally steep hill that eventually leads to Tabletop and a pleasant walk along the Tabletop track now completely track-marked and maintained well by our local DoC rangers, Tom and Tom. After the long descent to the old yards flat where we wanted to camp, we found two campers already in residence complete with a lovely fire. “We’ll put the billy on” was their greeting and so we spent the night with John and Sally for company. It was a very cold night on that flat for most of the night, but sometime predawn the NW warmed the place up somewhat but conditions did cause tents to be wet with condensation. Keen to get out of our tents we were all good to start again just after 8 am and quickly warmed up climbing the steep slope to the ridge that leads to Staircase Hut. A quick stop here for fuel and inspecting the resident rats in the hut and we go along the Staircase Ridge to find the right ridge to drop down into the higher reaches of the Middle Branch of the Waianakarua R. The gorgie river valley is cold, dark, slippery and a bit foreboding. It seems to take a long time to traverse the km to the opposite ridge we have to climb back out of. The river rocks are very slippery and one of the team experience the full emersion technique to measure the depth of the water, very unpleasant. A quick bite of food before the next steep ascent to find the Kahikatea Lodge. As soon as we had reached a slightly higher altitude, the temperature seemed to go up by at least 10 degrees and it turned into a very pleasant afternoon. We reached our destination at about 2pm and arrived to an empty hut. So we moved in, deciding that it would be nice to spend a night here in this new very nice hut. All the wet gear was drying fast in the warm NW sunny conditions and we lounged around in the sun until the sound of others approaching was heard. Eventually a young family with young girl and dog and Mum and Dad appeared at the hut door. They quickly claimed booked people rights (fairly rudely) and made it clear that they wanted the entire hut. We didn’t mind all that much and were happy too spend another night in our quickly erected tents rather than a night with poor company. It remained quite pleasantly warm during the night resulting in perfectly dry tents in the morning. About the same time as the previous day we strolled down the steep hill to the wee stream and the steep track back to the Mt Misery Rd Carpark. No car awaited us here, we were just getting started for the day. We walked back down Mt Misery Rd to the Glencoe sheds. Great coastal views over most of North Otago and the hinterlands and plenty of time to take it all in. We had a brief stop to talk to Anna on her way up to have a walk to the Lodge and back, testing her newly acquired 4wd. The road was in very good condition, the best I have ever seen and you could have driven pretty near any vehicle up to the carpark just now. Once at the sheds, we turned back down into Breakneck Rd and walked as far as the Podocarp Track which we descended and stopped for lunch under the big Kahikatea trees. A few obstacles saw us back on the Swallows and down it home to Goblin Woods by just after 1.
This was quite a strenuous trip probably in the fit range of our measure, it takes good mental fortitude to persist with the uphills when you’ve had enough. It was very satisfying to start our walk from my own house and the range of different environments we found ourselves in was stimulating . Two rifleman were seen and the cry of one karearea heard. Two very nice humans met and some with a bit further to go. Thanks to my two companions without who I would not have wanted to be there.Check Lorena’s Facebook feed for the photo’s and videos, she is much better at all of that.
Jenny, Lorena and Robbie went.
Mt Meyer (795m)
Sunday 17 May 2026
Mt Meyer (officially Meyer)[1] is in the hills on the north side of the Waitaki River just east of Station Peak. It had been many years since the club had done a trip into this area, so on fine but frosty morning nine of us set out from the historical house at Little Rodderick that had family connections with Lord Kitchener and Frances Parker.
From Little Rodderick at about 300m we followed a 4WD track up a ridge to a low saddle at about 600m. The climb up to the saddle was steady with great views of the Waitaki Valley. The back group found a shortcut that cut off about 50m of climbing that the front group missed, but we all re-grouped at the low saddle for a break.
From the saddle we then followed another 4WD track east steady climbing until Mt Meyer came into view and after about 2hrs of leaving the vehicles we were all on top at about 11.30am. A few photos were taken and the views were great, but it was a bit early for lunch. So we decided to carry on along the range to a trig point at 798m, just a couple of metres higher than Mt Meyer. As we got there the trig was no more than just a bit of scrub where it would have been, but after a wee bit of looking around we found parts of it in the long grass. They were pulled out and reconstructed back on the original site. I have later found out that every time there has been a club trip up there the trig has always been reconstructed, but it is getting less of it now with some of it rotting away in the ground.
We had a great spot for lunch in the sun with some great views down the Waitaki Valley and the mountains behind Kurow and the hills to the north. After lunch two of our party went back the same way and the rest of us took a track north for an hour dropping down into Mount Orr Stream. We carried up the stream for 1 km before taking a farm track up a valley to finally come back up to the low saddle where we were on in the morning and meeting back up with our other two members.
Its was then back down the ridge to Little Rodderick and the Vehicles after covering just over 12km in about 6hrs on a beautiful sunny autumn day.
Thanks to the farmer for letting us on their property and to Rex, David, Maurice, Jenny, John, Doug, Geoff and Mary for coming and enjoying the day with me.
–Neville
[1] Proposal: Place name proposal – Meyer (hill) https://www.linz.govt.nz/consultations/meyer
Gazette notice: Notice of a Final Determination to Approve a Geographic Name https://gazette.govt.nz/notice/id/2024-ln3452 (2 August 2024)
Mt Ida – Ida Range, Oteake Conservation Park
Sunday 24 May 2026
It had been almost 12 years since the previous trip to Mt Ida, led by Noel Pullan in July 2014, on a bitterly cold mid-winter day, that saw us turn around at about 1400 metres, after we all agreed that it was far too cold to continue on up into the thick layer of cloud covering the top of the range. Over the intervening years, I had made a few suggestions to various club members that perhaps it was time to have another crack it, so thanks to Jenny for including it on the autumn calendar.
After driving up to Palmerston from home in Dunedin, I met-up with the other five trampers, who had left Oamaru at the usual 8:00 am start time, before continuing in two vehicles along State Highway 85 through the Pigroot to the Mt Ida Station homestead, just over 3 kilometres past Wedderburn, where the Little Mt Ida access road starts from a farm yard about 300 metres past the homestead on the right-hand side of the road. We’d been assured by the station owner that the access road was in a good, dry condition (unlike 12 years prior), so there were no issues driving the 7.3 kilometres to where we parked, at the prominent right-angled corner of the road where it continues on up to the television transmission tower and building on top of Little Mt Ida.
At 10:22 am we set-off along the 4WD track from the road corner at 740 metres, initially following the course of the Ida Burn north, before turning northeast and climbing briefly up to a track junction at 880 metres, at the base of Mt Ida, covering the 3-kilometre distance in around 45 minutes. We stopped here for a morning tea break, while the last of the valley fog cleared, revealing a perfectly fine and calm day. From here, we crossed a boundary fence and started up the tussock slope beneath the rocky outcrops of the southwest spur. Based upon the winter ascent in 2014, I had described this initial climb as “quite steep”, but with an additional 12 years of ageing to take into consideration, I would now upgrade this rating to “very steep”!
We weaved our way up through, around and over the rock outcrops and after an hour and a half of hard slog, we had completed the ascent of the spur and settled down for a lunch break at 1425 metres, on what could now be described as the southwest ridge proper. We enjoyed a relaxed lunch in the sun, enjoying the spectacular views over the Maniototo Plain to the southwest. At 1:00 pm we resumed our ascent of the southwest ridge and despite the last 90 vertical metres requiring a scramble over some “quite steep” rocks, we were all at the large summit cairn at 1690 metres around 1:30 pm, a total of about 3 hours and 10 minutes from the vehicles. We sat in the late-autumn sun with mostly calm air and tried to take in the enormity of the scenery around us, from the vast expanse of the Maniototo Plain, stretching from the southeast, right around to the south, and southwest across the Manuherikia Valley, backed by the Dunstan Mountains and, even further back, Tapuae-o-Uenuku / Hector Mountains, The Remarkables, Mt Earnslaw / Pikirakatahi, Mt Aspiring / Tititea, around to the northwest and north to the distant chain of the Southern Alps / Kā Tiritiri o te Moana, culminating in Aoraki / Mt Cook and the countless high peaks of the Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park. To the northeast and east were our local peaks of the St Marys Range and Kakanui Mountains, where you could easily trace the routes of previous trips. It was a truly magnificent viewpoint and well worth the effort to get up there, especially on such a calm day with as much visual clarity as you could hope for. After making the most of the available photo opportunities, and a top-up of food and drink, it was time to begin the descent, departing from the summit cairn (which encloses the original 1881 trig station) at 2:13 pm, giving us 3 hours until sunset.
We made short work of the descent of the adjacent southern ridgeline, which lead us all the way down to the saddle in front of Little Mt Ida, before the final 20-30-minute steep climb up through the tussocks to the building and tower on the top of Little Mt Ida at 1169 metres. Although it was anticipated that we may have been there closer to 5:00 pm, and capture some sunset photos to the west, we had all departed from the top of Little Mt Ida by 4:10 pm, enjoying the easy walk down the access road to the parked vehicles at the bottom, with the last of the party arriving just after 4:40 pm, completing the 12.4-kilometre circuit in 6 hours and 20 minutes.
Soon after, we were back in the vehicles and on our way out to State Highway 85, before returning to Palmerston via the Pigroot, where we parted company at the end of what I would personally rate as one of the best days I’ve had in the hills.
Sincere thanks for the company of Jenny (and for organising and arranging the trip), Robbie, Julian, Jane Simpson and Jake (visitor).
Rodney Meiklejohn
(Dunedin-based NOTMC member)
