Day 1 summary: Start: Kaitoke (Kiwi ranch road end) End: Alpha hut Distance: 18.3km Elevation gain: 1,600m Hours on the trail (including breaks): 8ish Hut occupancy: ~26 people and a dog Six trampers arrived for an early 7:00am departure from Platform 9 on a stunning Saturday morning. We shared the van with Tereza and Aimee … Read more
On the Saturday morning at 7.30 am six still half-asleep but excited punters met at the train station and set off in the van making our way slowly to the Poads Road end to start our walk. The beauty about leaving at an early time on a Saturday morning is that there is no traffic … Read more
Alpha Hut was our plan B, as we could not make the Southern Crossing happen due to the closing of the Otaki Forks road. We met on Saturday bright and early at 6:30am at the train station, before driving to Kaitoke carpark (Kiwi Road end). We left around 7:45am and started walking in the beautiful … Read more
It didn’t take long for me to realize, on my second weekend back in Wellington, that I did not have the fitness to tackle the Mid-Otaki trip I had put on the schedule. Emily wisely suggested Island Forks instead, and I adopted the idea as my own. We had a romantic drive from Wellington to … Read more
Trampers were offered up one last golden weekend at the end of March, before being plunged into the darkness of daylight savings. Tereza, Mike M, Tom, Fain and I used this opportunity to bag perhaps the most famous of the “secret huts” in the Tararua Ranges – Snowy Hut. After some rental car difficulties, which … Read more
Despite the miserable forecast for Saturday, I was looking forward to Uta’s Medium ‘Holdsworth to Waiohine’ trip in the Tararuas. Not only is Uta a most excellent leader, but the company promised to be top-notch. In particular, I was looking forward to being reunited with my snowcraft buddy Juan who (when I wasn’t clinging to … Read more
The eight of us met at 8am Saturday, many clasping coffees to assist with the early start. I’ve done plenty of tramping, but this was my second trip with the club, so I was looking forward to meeting other “easy” going trampers. As I’d hoped, the conversation flowed readily with everyone. Lots of rain was … Read more
This was the first club trip for the 8 punters. Greg summarised his experience succinctly: “This weekend was a wet one! It started raining on the drive out to the Tararuas and continued intermittently throughout the trip. This tramp was an introduction to tramping for several attendees, which was exciting. We forded streams and squelched … Read more
On the Friday night at 5.30pm, six of us set off in the club van making our way slowly but surely to the Pines to start our walk and making a quick dinner pit stop in Carterton. We arrived at the start of our walk after 8pm and started walking to Mitre Flats hut at … Read more
I had last visited Mid Waiohine hut many years ago and I’ve been keen to go back there for a while. So I signed up for Matt and Maj-Britt’s trip there. We met at Wellington station on the Friday evening and departed for the Wairarapa. As we were driving we were already discussing other options … Read more