This is the first of two reports. The other by Big John, is at the end of this one from Rae

The club had a trip to Kaikoura at labour weekend.

We had lovely days but a bit cool, and cold in the evenings. We assembled at the main water front about 25 vehicles had turned up for the weekend. We were spit in to two groups the trip leaders were two guys from Kaikoura.

The first day we went with a tour guide he was very interesting, I don’t know what his name was. We left the water from at 10 am drove around the road a bit then on to a beach, the leader was the only one to get stuck. Left the beach and went to a river called the Kawhai and how the town was flooded some years ago. We followed this river for sometime until the group came to a big gravel pit where the boys and the toys had a big play.

Around 1pm we went up to the trip leaders farm for lunch the group slowly packed up and off we went going to a place called MT Fyffe, it was quiet away up. There were people walking it, got to the hut and it was a nice view around Kaikoura stayed up there for about ½ an hour on the way back Lloyd Knowles was having problems with his Toyota (lemon) so he went back to camp. Went on to a farm which was which was nice and green crossed a big river up to a slippery slop, Kevin did not go up, he stayed behind.

Diane Helen and though we would walk back got thing to let the guys know we had been there. Diane wonted to start walking back as she was missing her love one. We walked about 100 meters when the boys and their toys started arriving were have you been they wen’t up to have a look at a big tree, don’t mind us as it was getting very cold got back to camp around 6pm cleaned up then down to the bar to watch rugby, Auckland plays Otago.

I cheered for Auckland and I was getting the evil eye from people I was pretty full by the end of the night. Jackson had to take me home. Auckland won it was a good night and was a good weekend.
Lurch thanks a bunch
Rae.

Trip photos 

First stop was the lookout over Kaikoura where some routine maintenance was carried out, a stone was stuck in my disc brake (hence the trip report). After making sure Warwick was still with the right group it was off down to a track which led through some pine trees to a sandy spot to practice driving in the sand. Everyone had a go at driving up a small hill and to make it interesting also driving up it backwards (tip: high range in reverse seems to work best just remember 4wd high range not 2wd).

From there we made our way up the Kowhai river to the base of Mt Fith with plenty of commentary form Karl on the way, about some of the local history of Kaikoura and its flooding over the years. Once at the bottom of Mt Fith we unlocked the gate and began the quite step trek upwards passing a number of people walking. At the 1000mtr mark we had just enough time to snap a quick pic before the cloud came in and took the view. Karl said that they used to hang glide from this point but due to weather conditions and gearboxes not handling the steepness of the hill they pulled the pin. After another short drive we arrived at the hut for a quick stop and then turned around to begin the descent, which took maybe half and hour, compared to the fastest mountain bike down the same stretch at a time of 11 and bit minutes (mad).

Next was a stop at Karl’s home for lunch on the front lawn before going over to the back of his property for a demonstration of the Unimog and a play on some gravel piles and a muddy area.
We then headed off to take a look at a huge Totara tree.

Then it was back to the Motor camp for a Sheriff session.
Many thanks to Lurch, Doug and Karl for a great weekend.

Big John