July 2020 News

Kashmir Road, Ruahine FP (27 July 2020)

A post by a member of the RUG forum:

The “new” Longview Hut is fantastic.

The road to the car park, however, is buggered again. Our Forester made it up…just. But we cracked our radiator on the way out. $350 plus GST.

It’s only really accessable in large 4WDs. Two wheelers wouldn’t have a hope. One was parked down the bottom covered in mud having failed the final climb.

Perhaps it’s time to consider moving the car park to the bottom of that hill…

River levels: A stark warning (24 July 2020)

Below is a graph of the Makaroro River over the period including 1-2 June 2020 after heavy rainfall in the Ruahine catchment. The levels rose from their normal flow of just below 2 cubic metres per second to more than 76 cumecs in a matter of hours, then descended again sharply and only returned to normal flow after 24 hours. A salutory lesson when making judgement calls on crossing rivers.

This data was provided by Hawke’s Bay Regional Council from its Burnt Bridge monitoring station.

Breaking news – a bonus tramp!

An additional tramp is planned for October, to the Waioeka Conservation Area which adjoins the Urewera National Park west of SH 2 between Gisborne and Opotiki. The tramp runs from Monday 12 October to Wednesday the 14th.

This easy, two-night tramp starts with Koranga Forks Hut. It’s a two- to three-hour walk, so very do-able after the more than four-hour drive to the track start from Napier. The second day is a three- or four-hour river walk to Tawa Hut. Side walks can also be done. Both huts are six-bunkers. The last day will be a four- or five-hour tramp to the vehicle(s) then drive home.

Our second day route will depend on having a low river level. If the Kahunui Stream is high,  plan B is to abandon Tawa Hut and return home early.

Tramp organiser is Bruce Hodgson.  Registration through the online system. Click here to access the booking form.

And to find out more about the area and the tramp, click here.

An update about your online tramp booking system

The club’s online tramp registration system is popular! It worked from day 1, and we had a surprising amount of positive feedback and good ideas for developing it. We’re improving it as we go along – including some changes that will provide you with background to your tramp, and up-to-date information about transport arrangements and weather.

This booking system allows you to reserve your place on any trip without needing to make a phone call, send a txt message or do paperwork at club meetings.

To access it, you must have a Google account, and the Google Sheets app on your device.

Getting a Google account is easy and free – and you don’t need to have a Gmail email address. Just click here to set up yours.

Then go to the Tramp List (Meetings and Events), pick your tramp, key in your name, and we take care of the rest!