Despite the protestations of a certain long haired club member, oft quoted as saying “I’ve retired”, the Mountain House Hut was demolished by a Club work party ca. 2001. In its place, a pragmatic structure now stands known as Mountain House Shelter. This shelter was built off-site by club members under the close supervision of Gerard Galvin, before … Read more
Up the hill we went in the dark – not an inky dark, lit by a huge oculus-moon highlighting the jagged terrain amid fragmenting cloud. Not a breath of wind and a landscape bathed in ivory light made for a glorious hour up to Longview Hut for the night. Jessie’s headlamp threatened to add to … Read more
An endless summer holiday period about to come to a close. Warmth and a lack of precipitation forecast. The remaining question was where to take a full van of EM punters. Our trip was originally scheduled for Waitaewaewae, but Sarah, Rachel, Dan & I had tramped that route recently due to route adjustment when trips sharing … Read more
After a dismal forecast predicted for the weekend, our trip was changed to plan B which avoided swims in the Eastern Hutt river that had been part of plan A. Saturday saw a 7am start for the drive to Otaki Forks. From here we walked up the Pukeatua track with Emily setting a good pace. … Read more
Last year, rumors started to surface at Fergs that a new crag had been bolted near Waikanae, which was shortly followed by the whinges of seasoned climbers, ‘yeah right, a big long bush bash for crumbling greywacke.’ But then Christmas arrived and Santa delivered a guide to the Wellington Rock Climbing facebook group. See Waikanae … Read more
When my brother emailed me the link to the Rafting NZ webpage, asking if I’d be happy for him to book the trip, I saw the words ‘extreme’ but figured that was just marketing, and didn’t read much further. So that is how I came to be booked to raft both the Kaituna River (with … Read more
I could hardly resist the trip description for this year’s annual craft beer tramp: We have a great route planned – specifically designed to include the high altitude of Kelburn and the rough terrain of the botanic gardens! A map of the intended route is attached (this is the only club trip where google-maps can replace … Read more
On Saturday morning around 8.15 we boarded our ferry in fine weather, along with a large group of day visitors, for the 10 to 15 minute trip to Kapiti Island. Despite warnings of bad weather brewing we had a pleasant journey. On arrival at Rangatira Flat we volunteers were greeted by DOC rangers Gen and … Read more
We started with a well-used pattern: depart Wellington railway station, dinner at Bulls and then camp at the very nice campsite by the river at Mangaweka. For company on the trip we had a party of three cyclists. The night at Mangaweka was uneventful although the temperature dropped below zero and the tents were coated … Read more
For once the Metservice long term weather forecast for the Tararuas was accurate, promising a three day potpourri of sunshine, gale force winds and heavy rain following on from a snow storm on the Friday. This necessitated a change from the original plan of the Jumbo-Holdsworth Loop due to the gale force winds on the … Read more