Labour Weekend 26-28 October 2019

Leader: Tony Quayle

This trip was suggested by Owen to take the overflow from the heavily-subscribed Southern Crossing David was organising. Ironically, with dire weather forecast for Sunday - the critical ‘tops’ day on David’s trip - the Southern Crossing was postponed, leaving just Marian, Owen and me doing the Winchcombe.

Fortunately the 3 of us were able to get away around midday Friday and head up to Kime for the night. This allowed us to tackle our exposed tops section on Saturday in really good weather. Marian’s newly discovered therapy for tiredness (vacuuming) paid dividends for all of us as we climbed on to Hector, where we branched off onto the Winchcombe. This ridge looks easy and quick from Hector, but a few mildly ‘nurgly’ bits slowed us down a bit.

We had a longish lunch at the former Winchcombe Biv site - partly because Owen undertook a lengthy and unsuccessful search for a crystal-clear drinking water source. The ridge from here to Neill was quite slow travel, with a poorly marked track and a bit of unexpected clambering up short sharp rock faces. Beyond Neill the terrain became easier, at about the same rate we became wearier, so it was a relief to finally reach Cone peak and locate a relatively sheltered campsite in the stunted beech. It wasn’t an evening to sit around outside though, and after a quick dehy dinner we retired to our tents.

Sunday dawned windy, very windy, so we downed a very quick snack and coffee before bailing out down to the Tauherenikau valley where we eventually had a proper breakfast at Cone Hut. An easy and very pleasant wander down the valley got us to Tutuwai earlier enough to score bunks before the hut filled to overflowing.

Overnight rain cleared in time for our exit over Mt Reeves, and the new ‘centre of NZ, including continental shelf’ plaque that by some miracle is right beside a track rather than deep in some godforsaken scrub or precipitous gully. Beyond the plaque, the track to the Woodside roadend forms a large S and while it’s pleasant travel it takes a surprisingly long time. Fortunately this slight delay suited David, our pickup driver, who ended up with time to walk up the track to meet us and, in chivalrous fashion, carry Marian’s pack the final kilometre to the car.

Those on the trip were:

Tony Quayle, Owen Cox, Marian Cox