Well, my last post from my Fellowship. I have been home since Sunday following a rough flight home. I have just about recovered but am finding it somewhat cold. The temperature was 29 degrees when I left Christchurch and it is minus 1 here today at home.
All it remains for me to say is a HUGE thanks to the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust for giving me the once-in-a-lifetime fantastic opportunity to spend my 5 weeks in New Zealand, meeting lots of lovely people, walking in some awesome places and learning a lot about the way tramping/walking is organised there. I think the two countries can learn from each other and benefit walking both home and abroad.
I guess the high points were doing the Tongariro crossing with Taupo Trampers, nearly climbing Mt Arthur but doing Winter Peak adjacent to it instead due to time shortage and of course the New Zealand scenery in general.
Some statistics: I drove over 1500 miles, walked with or gave talks to 9 clubs, highest point reached was the top of Mt Tongariro 1978, I am not sure of total distance walked but the longest tramp I think was about 16km (10 miles).
Finally, thanks also go to all the people who made me feel so welcome in New Zealand - on their walks and in their homes. The whole Fellowship wouldn't have been possible without them. Thank you all.
..and thanks to all who have been reading my blog and following my travels.
Audrey
Friday, 17 December 2010
Thursday, 9 December 2010
last full day
Today (Friday) is my last full day in New Zealand and the weather has turned grey with the risk of rain...so perhaps not as hard to leave had it been gloriously sunny as it has been a lot of the time I have been here.
My talk to Christchurch Tramping Club went ok. It was a small audience of about 12 but I was told that was because the Alpine Club were having a book launch last night so I guess that isn't too bad as competition for my talk! The club is the first I have come across that has its own Training Officer - who happens to be from Derbyshire - and they run courses in river crossings, navigation, winter skills etc. They plan their walks slightly differently from the OFTC that I met the other day in that CTC have one person in the club who is responsible for ALL contact with landowners for access permission (OFTC leave that to the individual tramp leaders to do so), so it is interesting to see how different clubs approach things in different ways. We had a good discussion on the insurance aspects and on UK Ordnance Survey maps and NZ Topo maps. I reckon about half the audience were actually Brits so I didn't need to do the hard sell on walking in the UK this time!!
Today, I return my hire car and start to think about packing. I am out for a meal with the family tonight in town to say Goodbye and Merry Christmas etc and can't believe 5 weeks have passed already. I have to re-read my own blog to see where I have been and what I have done.
Watch this space for a round up posting when I get back to snowy UK!!!
My talk to Christchurch Tramping Club went ok. It was a small audience of about 12 but I was told that was because the Alpine Club were having a book launch last night so I guess that isn't too bad as competition for my talk! The club is the first I have come across that has its own Training Officer - who happens to be from Derbyshire - and they run courses in river crossings, navigation, winter skills etc. They plan their walks slightly differently from the OFTC that I met the other day in that CTC have one person in the club who is responsible for ALL contact with landowners for access permission (OFTC leave that to the individual tramp leaders to do so), so it is interesting to see how different clubs approach things in different ways. We had a good discussion on the insurance aspects and on UK Ordnance Survey maps and NZ Topo maps. I reckon about half the audience were actually Brits so I didn't need to do the hard sell on walking in the UK this time!!
Today, I return my hire car and start to think about packing. I am out for a meal with the family tonight in town to say Goodbye and Merry Christmas etc and can't believe 5 weeks have passed already. I have to re-read my own blog to see where I have been and what I have done.
Watch this space for a round up posting when I get back to snowy UK!!!
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
nearly over....
Well, today (Thursday) is my 2nd last day in New Zealand as I fly home on Saturday. I am giving a talk to the Christchurch Tramping Club in town tonight and have added a lot of the information I have gained in my 5 weeks here so I hope it makes sense to them! Today, I went for my last swim here - in the 25m indoor pool this time as there were 700 children in the outdoor facility - end of term school trips - then did some Christmas shopping. I have to admit that I don't feel Christmassy yet as it is back up to 19 degrees and very sunny today. No doubt I will do when I get back to the minus 8 degree temperatures at home. Everyone here has commented on how awful the UK weather is and how their petrol prices have gone up here in NZ as the result of the demands being placed on oil in frozen Europe...It is still half the price that it is in the UK though.
View from the window of the house in Governors Bay where I am staying:
View from the window of the house in Governors Bay where I am staying:
coldest day so far!!
Today (Wednesday), I went for a tramp with the Christchurch Over 40s Tramping Club to High Peak in the Malvern Hills near Darfield and Glentunnel. Darfield had the misfortune of being virtually the epicentre of the Sept 4th Christchurch earthquake and many buildings still show the damage caused by the 7.1 scale 'quake.
We had a very easy morning walk to the top of High Peak via grassy farm tracks with good views despite the coldest weather I have experienced so far on my travels - it was only 9 degrees!!
Me on the left at the top of High Peak (1400m)
At lunchtime, I had to give an impromptu presentation on my Churchill Fellowship and how walking in the UK differs from NZ. I then had 3 minutes to eat my lunch!
After lunch, the party split, with some taking the easy path back to the cars (1 hour) and the majority of us opting to climb to a ridge and then take the longer route back. Well, an hour's detour turned into 2 and a half hours as we "bush bashed" a path through head high broom, gorse, "supple jack" vines and beech forest!!! We were never lost as the leader had excellent map and compass skills but he was following someone else's recce notes and so we were not sure exactly where to descend from the ridge to the bottom. After being scratched and slipping on muddy terrain, we eventually found the road and an easy walk back to the cars. The group were at great pains to insist that it was not their usual walking style!!! Still, we all got back in one piece, even if we did all need a good hot bath!
A mountain goat having a good laugh at us:
I learned a lot about the way the group works through chatting to members on the walk and they are very well organised, with over 400 members. They have different grades of walks from 1 (easy) to 4/5 (hard/technical) and walks are planned in 4 month blocks with each person on the planning group allocated a month to look after, whereby they find leaders willing to lead the chosen walks for that month (although some leaders do come forward with their own ideas for walk) and then the leaders are responsible for recceing the walk and contacting landowners for permission if needed. I also learned a lot more about landowners' attitudes to access.
We had a very easy morning walk to the top of High Peak via grassy farm tracks with good views despite the coldest weather I have experienced so far on my travels - it was only 9 degrees!!
Me on the left at the top of High Peak (1400m)
At lunchtime, I had to give an impromptu presentation on my Churchill Fellowship and how walking in the UK differs from NZ. I then had 3 minutes to eat my lunch!
After lunch, the party split, with some taking the easy path back to the cars (1 hour) and the majority of us opting to climb to a ridge and then take the longer route back. Well, an hour's detour turned into 2 and a half hours as we "bush bashed" a path through head high broom, gorse, "supple jack" vines and beech forest!!! We were never lost as the leader had excellent map and compass skills but he was following someone else's recce notes and so we were not sure exactly where to descend from the ridge to the bottom. After being scratched and slipping on muddy terrain, we eventually found the road and an easy walk back to the cars. The group were at great pains to insist that it was not their usual walking style!!! Still, we all got back in one piece, even if we did all need a good hot bath!
A mountain goat having a good laugh at us:
I learned a lot about the way the group works through chatting to members on the walk and they are very well organised, with over 400 members. They have different grades of walks from 1 (easy) to 4/5 (hard/technical) and walks are planned in 4 month blocks with each person on the planning group allocated a month to look after, whereby they find leaders willing to lead the chosen walks for that month (although some leaders do come forward with their own ideas for walk) and then the leaders are responsible for recceing the walk and contacting landowners for permission if needed. I also learned a lot more about landowners' attitudes to access.
Monday, 6 December 2010
Penguins and boulders
Today (Monday), I travelled to Oamaru about 4 hours south of Christchurch in order to visit a Little Blue Penguin Colony. The site is an old quarry which was abandoned in the 1970s and the penguins began to come ashore and nest on the site. During the 1990s and the 2000s, the area was taken over by the local development corporation and a visitor centre and monitoring scheme developed. The penguins come ashore at night after a day's fishing and go to their nest boxes then go back out to sea in the morning. Visitors watch them coming ashore in the evening from a grandstand but no photography is allowed as it would frighten the penguins. The sodium lighting used to light the ramp they use to come ashore is not visible to a penguin evidently!! You can, however, photograph any in the nest boxes during the day....I tried....
A penguin beak sticking out of a box (best I could do!!!!):
A weekly check of nest boxes and the flipper tags on every bird enables breeding success to be monitored and compared with a "control" colony nearby which has no public access. Breeding success is the same at each site, so the public viewing seems to have no ill effects on the birds.
I also visited the Moeraki Boulders - a group of almost completely spherical boulders on the coast south of Oamaru.
A penguin beak sticking out of a box (best I could do!!!!):
A weekly check of nest boxes and the flipper tags on every bird enables breeding success to be monitored and compared with a "control" colony nearby which has no public access. Breeding success is the same at each site, so the public viewing seems to have no ill effects on the birds.
I also visited the Moeraki Boulders - a group of almost completely spherical boulders on the coast south of Oamaru.
Sunday, 5 December 2010
Mt Herbert
On Sunday, I joined Christchurch Tramping Club for a walk up Mt Bradley on the Banks Peninsula. Graded an "easy" walk, we set off in 26 degrees and blazing sunshine and made it to Packhorse Hut in just over an hour where it clouded over!.
We then decided to walk to the top of Mt Bradley via the "round the mountain" track. However, we missed the turn off to the top of the mountain so we decided to press on and go to the top of neighbouring Mt Herbert instead - which is actually higher than Mt Bradley and the highest peak on the Banks Peninsula.
We then descended to meet up with two members of the party who had stayed behind and who had agreed to meet us at the hut. They weren't there so we carried on down to the cars expecting to see them there. They weren't......With no mobile signal and no other way they could have gone, we decided the best option was to leave the walk leader (and wife of one of the missing people) to wait until they appeared and for the rest of us to drive to a mobile signal area and phone their home... which we did and discovered the two of them had taken a lift out of the valley and back to Christchurch with two people they had met on the track. They had left a note at the hut but none of us saw it!! Glad that all was well, we drove back to the track start to tell the leader she could go home after all!! We agreed that it was a classic case of how things can go wrong if the party splits up.
The tramping club is very active in its training and offers training on river crossings, first aid, winter skills and map skills. It seems they have been called upon a few times to help others in difficulty while they have been out on club tramps.
We then decided to walk to the top of Mt Bradley via the "round the mountain" track. However, we missed the turn off to the top of the mountain so we decided to press on and go to the top of neighbouring Mt Herbert instead - which is actually higher than Mt Bradley and the highest peak on the Banks Peninsula.
The tramping club is very active in its training and offers training on river crossings, first aid, winter skills and map skills. It seems they have been called upon a few times to help others in difficulty while they have been out on club tramps.
Around Christchurch
On Friday, I did the tourist bit in Christchurch - had a swim in the fabulous 50m outdoor pool at Jellie Park then went to the Antarctic Centre by the airport and had a fantastic 3 hours wandering around the exhibition - but didn't feel the need to go into the "what snow feels like" room.......!!! A highlight for me was the little blue penguin colony - rescued and disabled penguins now living in their own pool and nesting area in the centre.
On Saturday, I went on a charity walk at Fisherman's Bay near Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula, organised by the Banks Peninsula Conservation Society to raise funds for their conservation work.
The walk began at a fabulous garden created by Jill and Richard right above the bay and consisting of native NZ and exotic plants. Created over the last 5-7 years from bare farmland, it is wonderful and contains some strange sculptures!!
After lunch among the seals in the bay, we visited an area of land that they have "covenanted" in perpetuity to the QEII Conservation Trust. By fencing it off from cattle grazing, the native vegetation is being allowed to naturally regenerate and some very rare plants are now thriving.
While not a traditional "tramp", I did chat to some people who do go tramping with local groups and it was interesting to hear one lady say that the reason she joined a tramping club was to enable her to see more of New Zealand and particularly to get access to land that she couldn't access without being a member, i.e. areas where landowner permission is needed for access and this is often easier when with a club than on your own. In addition, Jill, as a working farmer, was of the opinion that she would LIKE people to have access to their land in order that they better appreciate the countryside and learn to respect it as a working landscape, particularly people from towns who may not have an understanding of farming and the countryside. From dicussions I have had with tramping groups, not all farmers share this willing attitude, however, and in fact my planned trip for the weekend was cancelled partly due to the landowner withdrawing access to his land.
The walk began at a fabulous garden created by Jill and Richard right above the bay and consisting of native NZ and exotic plants. Created over the last 5-7 years from bare farmland, it is wonderful and contains some strange sculptures!!
After lunch among the seals in the bay, we visited an area of land that they have "covenanted" in perpetuity to the QEII Conservation Trust. By fencing it off from cattle grazing, the native vegetation is being allowed to naturally regenerate and some very rare plants are now thriving.
While not a traditional "tramp", I did chat to some people who do go tramping with local groups and it was interesting to hear one lady say that the reason she joined a tramping club was to enable her to see more of New Zealand and particularly to get access to land that she couldn't access without being a member, i.e. areas where landowner permission is needed for access and this is often easier when with a club than on your own. In addition, Jill, as a working farmer, was of the opinion that she would LIKE people to have access to their land in order that they better appreciate the countryside and learn to respect it as a working landscape, particularly people from towns who may not have an understanding of farming and the countryside. From dicussions I have had with tramping groups, not all farmers share this willing attitude, however, and in fact my planned trip for the weekend was cancelled partly due to the landowner withdrawing access to his land.
Wednesday, 1 December 2010
A few quiet days
I arrived in Christchurch yesterday (Wed) and am spending a couple of days chilling out and doing laundry!! Unfortunately, my planned tramp to Godley Peak with the Geraldine Club on 4/5 Dec has been cancelled due to the leader being in hospital and a landowner withdrawing consent for us to cross his land to access the track. So, instead, I have arranged to go on a walk with the Banks Peninsula Conservation Society on Saturday to help raise money for local conservation work, including saving the tui ( a native NZ bird) and, on Sunday, I will do a day tramp with Christchurch Tramping Club so reports to follow on those trips.
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