Wellington Tramping and Mountaineering Club
Enjoying the great outdoors since 1947
INTRODUCTION The purpose of running the trip as an Alp1 “PLUS” was to give experienced Alp1-level members a chance to try something with a bit more exposure, and maybe needing the occasional rope to make crossing certain features safer. This proved to be a very popular proposal, and despite this being a Fit trip I … Read more
One of my favourite pieces of poetry is a prose poem by the great 19th century French poet Charles Baudelaire called Get Drunk. In English translation it goes like this: Get Drunk! It is essential to be drunk all the time. That’s all: there’s no other problem. If you do not want to feel the … Read more
I signed up to this trip with very unalturistic motives – I was enormously curious to see the “lodge” that everyone at the club keeps talking about. In my head I pictured one of the huts on the great walks – which most trampers consider the height of luxury – and have flush toilets, lights … Read more
Summer at the lodge is great! … 6-7 May, looking for Lodge working party sign-ups … 2017 rates announced, great discounts for families … Group bookings – take your club or youth group or school to the lodge … Lost property – are these your pants?
After a relatively quick ride to WTMC Ruapehu Lodge, we had the general introduction – we were asked to kindly not to put the lodge on fire and told when we were expected to be ready for the tramps. The lodge is much more comfortable than a road end since road ends don’t have spring mattresses, … Read more
The WTMC hosted the 2016 Bum Sliding Competition at Mt Ruapehu on Saturday 5 November. There was a large turnout of enthusiastic riders (5 total) and many spectators lined the courses to watch (3 total for the last 10 minutes). The weather was described as ‘atmospheric’, meaning mist, rain, snow, and wind in various combinations … Read more
20 beginner alpinists, 5 instructors, 2 teams and 1 mountain to conquer. Two packed vans and one car left a windy Wellington behind, with sights set on Mt Ruapehu. The drive up offered long and tedious discussions about what the name of our team was going to be, and to Brendan’s delight we settled for … Read more
We’re getting excited about the 2016 Whakapapa snow season. The Ruapehu crew have secured a licence renewal with DOC, and so a flood of money is set to hit the Whakapapa facilities. This means a new quad express lift to replace the Centennial Chair this year, and a quad chairlift to replace the Waterfall T-bar in 2017. Good … Read more
Ruapehu traverse by pictures A 2 day hiking loop trip from Tukino Village over Te Heu Heu peak on Mt Ruapehu
Driving up to the Sratford Plateau car park at 5.45am on Saturday morning I’m hoping someone has spread lots of grit on the road so there is no ice to cope with. It’s a mild morning and the damp road has not frozen overnight. Relieved I park and we clamber out and assemble our gear … Read more