Saturday was a lovely sunny winters day. Well it was in Omakau and Roxburgh . Alexandra -if you were very tall and could see over the bank of fog in the valley. Surprisingly there were nearly 40 members who appeared at Como Villa for our walk. Whether or not some had a plan to get lost in the fog and stay at the winery , I am not sure.
All groups headed down Marshall Road for a walk along the river track, or over the Earnscleugh tailings. They had to stick within sight of each other to avoid wandering in circles in the fog. The W1s had a very big group ,although I suspect a number of W2s got caught up following the W1s ,losing site of the W2 pack. What can one say about the tailings. Well we did learn it was one of the harrier club’s founders ,Dick Dowland , who planted a range of pine species in the middle of the tailings in the 1960s. Amazing how they have grown and survived all these years, growing in gravel with no care, no one watering them. There are still a number of dredging relics scattered over the tailings and amazing to see the dredge buckets still bringing up some treasures to this day. I suspect it was a relief to some that DOC did not set up a checkpoint on the bridge ,to check for the smuggling of small stones from the tailings. Although I suspect some shoes and boots got a shake down when they got home.
I also found an old aerial photo showing the scope of tailings. I know it is an old photo due to the bridge still there at the bottom of Marshall road. The Earnscleugh # 2 dredge was one of the largest dredges to operate in the Alexandra area. The Alexandra dredge built in 1936 was the last dredge to operate at Earnscleugh from 1949 -1963 It was 50m long ,13.4m wide and could dig down to 19.8metres. If you are wondering why the tailings seem pretty flat in places, that was due to a plan to level things off and plant trees ,which obviously never happened.
This Saturday we head to the carpark on the East side of the Roxburgh Dam. We have been advised that the bus will depart corner Walton & Thompson streets at 12:25pm , with A-Ls duty pack this week. This gives walking groups options of going upstream or down stream of the dam. The Roxburgh regulars claim they will have some sunshine organized. But I suspect more cloud ,just for a change
I will not be there this Saturday , so enjoy your outing and remember to send photos and tall stories in.
Hope the sun shines on you all
Gary