Author: Dave

Waitati

Hikers Report for Waitati on 30/10/2019.

Twenty three hikers took welcomed refuge at the Blue Skin Cafe from the forecast down pour that struck our party a short distance from the cars. The hike was commenced in pleasant hiking conditions on the board walk to the west of Orokonui Lagoon from the Doctors Point Road.

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Photo and Caption John – “I’ve seen friendlier skies”

 

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Photo and Caption John – “I think I’ll have a muffin with my coffee today”
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Photo and Caption John – “Good to be back!”

From there it was a morning tea stop by the substation. From there we had foot paths to the Waitati school where it was hoped that a person from the Blueskin Resilient Communities Trust
would provide information on the schools addition of their solar panels, the BEL solar power buy back scheme & their involvement with the Eco House Build that is to be displayed at the Home &
Living show on the 2nd & 3rd of November at Forsyth Barr stadium. This house was constructed by women. It was due to attending to the final details of the Eco house that the BRCT were unable to oblige.

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Photo and Caption John – “Enjoying the Opeke track”

The next point of interest was half way up View St we came upon a couple attending to fitting new number plates to a car. The woman who was obviously very proud of this just completed conversion of this vehicle to pure electric. (EV) The bonnet was lifted to show the very neat functional set up which had a range of 140 kilometres. She just had to have a photo of the car & amp;
group. At the top of View St we crossed a sheep paddock to the top of the Waitati cemetery.

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Photo and Caption John – “So much History”

 

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Photo and Caption John – “Old meets new”

Apart from the final downpour it was a pleasant stroll completing the eastern Orokonui Lagoon walkway to Doctors Point Road up to Opeke for lunch & return to the cars.

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Photo and Caption John – “These are the good old days!!”

Leaders were Betty & Jim Finnie

Black Gully Dam/Careys Creek

Careys Creek, Rongami, Honeycomb, Evansdale Glen, Black Gully Dam – Information and Trips Library Post

12 clean and dry trampers arrived  with poles and putties at Double Hill carpark(after leaving a car at Evansdale) at 10am ready for this downhill track to Evansdale Glen.  Due to a shower we swapped a layer for a jacket.

We headed off descending through the manuka with views over the gully down to the dam.  (This dark dam along with remaining pipeline was the water supply to the Seacliff Mental Hospital).

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Black Gully Dam – Photo Gordon

After the visit to the dam, creek crossings started along this rather rugged, muddy slippery track to a sheltered spot for smoko at 10:30am.

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Jill doing balancing act at morning tea – Photo – Gordon

By memory the muddy patches  were worse than previous trips, which caused the odd member to slip and have a closer look at the mud!

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However, it was great to be amongst such lovely healthy native bush, particularly the fushia and ferns.

We continued crossing Carey’s creek  and walking up the creek bed a couple of times for about 50 metres, often negotiating slippery rocks and mud glorious mud!  Our leader managed to find an umbrella of branches at 12:30 for a  half hour lunch break.

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With the majority of crossings over, the track levelled out and soon we were walking through a grass verged track admiring the lime green willow leaves to the glen.  Careys Creek crossings were counted by 2 members, both arriving at 22.

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Could have been 23, but we walked over the foot bridge at the end.

After arriving at the glen, drivers raced off ahead to pick up cars and drive us to Blue Skin Nursery cafe for our coffee and cake fix.

As always, we all enjoyed the day.  For 8 of the group it was their 1st time on this track with our club.  We needed jackets on, lucky though, no wind and little rain, mainly drips from the trees.  Must admit the putties, pack and jacket were very muddy and took some scrubbing.  However, the boots were clean.

In Anthony Hamel’s book, he quoted—“This is a rugged and remote area and the track can fall into disrepair.  In 2006 The  Green Hut Track Group did many hours of work on this track”.  Once again it is very pleasing to see they have been back on the job and apart from muddy patches today, the track is in very good condition(with new steps dug in a couple of places).  Thanks for your great effort.

Eleanore and Arthur