20 September 2009

Leader: Tony Gibson

Six members ventured on Tony’s medium plus trip into another interesting and historic Coromandel valley which is “off the beaten track”.  The previous week we had been up the adjacent Neavesville valley to explore the site of an old stamper battery.

Tracks in the Puriri Valley are now becoming overgrown and we spent time clearing some sections of track and putting up markers where needed.  The tracks are old tramlines and pack tracks and still very obvious in places.

Our two destinations on this tramp are to an old kauri dam further upstream and then up a skidway which leads to a more recent logging site.  We went up to the logging site first, passing some large kauri stumps along the way.   Lunch at the clearing here, then we retraced our steps back down to the stream, followed by an off-track scramble up the stream to a fairly intact kauri dam.  This is a sight definitely worth seeing!

It took us two hours from the dam back to the cars.  During the course of the day, all six of us slipped over at least once and Bevan had the misfortune to bend his leki stick during one fall.  This trip was last done in July 2006 taking 6 ¼ hours, however today’s trip took a bit longer at 7 ¼ hours, probably due to extra time spent track clearing and marking. On behalf of Doug, Malcolm, Peter J and Bevan, thanks Tony, I’m sure we all enjoyed the day’s tramping.

Marlene