This Saturday we will meet at 12 noon corner Walton & Thompson streets, to catch a bus out to Ida Valley Station with A-Ls duty pack this week.
This is a little further south from Merino Ridges a couple of weeks ago , towards Poolburn Dam
On Saturday the dangerous dozen set off for a walk in the Chatto Creek area , keen to explore the tunnel for the water race from the Manuherika River gorge under the hill to the Chatto creek water race.
Were they attacked by the giant Weta’s , the hungry eels or the snappy fish ? Well , they all made it out the other side and managed to get out of the water race.. So , there was no need to flush the tunnel out to dislodge any stuck harriers. Perhaps I can mention now that Susan had a digger booked for Monday morning , to clear the grate of the pipeline heading down the hill towards the Chatto Creek Pub. Said it was too much work to throw the bodies out of the race up there. A digger makes it a lot easier.
Meantime ,the rest of the walkers arrived at the Chatto Creek carpark just after 1pm. They split into 3 groups W1s & W2As , W2Bs and the W3s. All headed off in the same direction ,across the road,up the hill by the pipeline ,then follow the water race round the valleys. How many in each group ? Good question , the W3s definitely had 3 as the name suggests , The W1 /W2As had a dozen or so , another half dozen couldn’t decide if they were W2As or W2Bs , then there were another 14 or so in the W2Bs. So the group numbers ebbed and flowed. A couple of walkers rescued a ewe that had fallen into the race. Well done those walkers
When they got to the fence across the race track ,they were supposed to drop down ,cross the road and then follow the road up the hill. NOT squeeze through the gate saying no Access, to the viaduct. Please be aware , there are a number of property owners in the area, as well as occupiers, which are not always the same thing. Just because you have gone there in the past , does not mean you can still go there.
One group did follow instructions and headed up the hill road.
All groups were back to afternoon tea within about 5 minutes or so of each other.
This Saturday we head for Ida Valley station , the farm ,not the Railway station, which are at different end of the Ida Valley. We head south towards Poolburn Dam area
And here is the link to OCAD Sketch for those using Joe’s maps
I am now using a new version of Outlook to send my emails out, so had to manually move all my email addresses over to the new version. So if someone finds they no longer get the emails , they will need to email me so i can check their name is on my new harrier list (over 200 names ).
Likewise a reminder , if you want off the email chain , email back and i will remove your name.
A bit of cloud forecast for Saturday with a shower possible , so possibly bring a jacket. Hope to see you all out in the Ida Valley.
Gary