Navigator Canyon, Owhango

Brendon and I woke at a reasonable hour in Taupo, but with a bit of driving and a new canyon to descend, we got on the road smartly. It took us about an hour to drive round to Owhango, where we loaded our stuff in Brendon’s 4WD and bounced our way up the hill to the carpark.

Since my recce visit, there had been a significant fire; charred bushes all around left the air with a sooty smell. With 210m of rope between us, our packs were pretty heavy, but we felt confident that we could deal with the drops that the canyon had in store for us.

Leaving the map in my pack, I confidently led us to the start of the canyon which was about 25 minutes walk. Brendon’s interest was suitably piqued as he peered over the first little drop and into our canyon. Suiting up and getting underway, we made the most of our neoprene by jumping the little drops that we’d down climbed on the recce.

Soon we arrived at the first rap; let the games begin! Much to our delight, the canyon remained mostly free of debris and continued to throw little obstacles in our way. Another couple of jumps or two and a small rappel keeping us occupied.

Rounding one corner, a foreboding horizon line had us exchange knowing grimaces. We moved forward quickly but cautiously to inspect the first big drop in the canyon. There wasn’t a good spot to look over the edge, so we had to rig our anchor and go on safety in order to peer over the lip. Brendan’s eyes lit up and he let out a ‘Yee-haa!’. After a few discussions on how we were going to tackle the pitch and a ‘paper-scissors-rock’ for the task of first down, I clipped on rappel and began toward the edge. We had a 90m x 11mm rope and although we were confident it would reach the bottom, I decided to make sure by throwing the rope to watch it reach the bottom. We didn’t really have a proper rope bag for it, so it was back to basics for the throw. I watched most of it disappear into the waterfall but didn’t see it reach the bottom. First mistake. Then I figured I should be sweet to rappel. Second mistake.

Only 20m down the fall, I was getting pounded by the flow whilst trying to untangle the rope. It had looped itself around a small rock bollard just a few feet above me. I’d rapped past the bollard looking the other way, and by the time I noticed the problem I was already below the protrusion. Perhaps I should have converted to ascending for a few feet to make it easier, but I was a little unnerved under the flow so chose to persist trying to flick the rope off the bollard from below. Eventually I had to recoil the remaining 70m of rope whilst under the water fall, and use the rock climbers trick of slings off the harness to substitute for a rope bag.

Meanwhile, Brendan was getting a little worried at my lack of progress. We could just make each other’s shape out through the spray and I ensured I periodically gave him the ‘Ok’ signal so he didn’t worry. He later confided that he was just about to convert our system to a lower and begin a to let me go from above. Lesson’s re-learned. ALWAYS use a rope bag. And don’t throw it unless you’re sure it’ll not get caught in anything on the way down…

With the problem now sorted, I was able to continue on rappel and traverse out of the main flow of the fall to a spot where I could take a deep breath and begin to enjoy the ride. Not wanting to end up back in the flow again, I continued to delicately traverse past a few bumps on the pitch and round a small pool about 60m from the top. Finally reaching the large open pool at the bottom of the pitch, I was glad to be off rope. As arranged, Brendan had tied the 60m x 8mm static and the 60m x 6mm pull cord together and ziplined both the rope bags down the rappel line. The tatic worked well, with both bags and a pull cord safely in my hands allowing him to rap uninterrupted.

I’d been sorting out the rope in the fall for a good 15 minutes and the pounding cold water had chilled me somewhat. I put on my extra Neo layer and Spray Jacket and began doing some star jumps whilst Brendan rapped down to join me. We excitedly debriefed the pitch then set about pulling the rope, which was rather difficult and warmed me up well.

Manawatu River

No sooner were we walking down stream and feeling chuffed about how our ‘first descent’ was turning out than we discovered the remains of an old rope. Marked ‘HTG 120M’, Brendan identified it as a Hamilton Tomo (Caving) Group rope. After getting over our surprise, we contemplated why the well tattered rope ended up in the stream. Perhaps it got stuck on a trip then later washed down in a flood? Adding the ‘historical rubbish’ to our packs, we continued downstream.

Whilst we were waiting with anticipation for the other large fall as marked on the map, other obstacles gave us challenges to overcome. A small rap, a couple of neat slides and a jump or two made things fun.

Before long we made it to what appeared to be the other big rap. Scouting the drop, we found it difficult to see the bottom as the fall did a large ‘S’ turn and the edges were well protected by foliage. The mouth of the pitch was blocked by a large wedged log. Not particularily wanting to abseil with this hanging over our heads, we set about trying to shift it. After about an hour of fruitless excavation, pushing, z-drag pulleys and thrown boulders we realized we may as well have let it be….

It was Brendan’s turn to go first, so he carefully ducked beneath the log whilst threading the pull cord over the top of the same log. The geometry of the anchor/log/waterfall was such that we needed the pull cord on top of the log to reduce friction. This careful setup paid dividends, as Brendan quickly gave me the off rope signal by pulling a few meters through on the pull side. I watched the Carabiner Block and adjusted its orientation slightly before also going on rappel. It was a great sinous pitch of 45m; but not the 60m as marked on the map. There must be more to the canyon…

There was a fair bit of walking to be done, though the occasional delightful canyoniferous section made it very enjoyable. One further small fall was quickly rappelled before we started to debate where we actually were on the map.

Things weren’t really matching up between what we were seeing on the map compared to our surroundings. Soon the tops of the forest ahead began to disappear, looking like the horizion line for our final big fall.

Imagine our surprise then, when we walked out of the bush and straight into the wide expanse of the Whakapapa River! We were sure we’d parked our car at the base of the canyon, but here we were, on a large river where there was supposed to be a car-park.

Exchanging confused laughs and quizzical looks, we scrambled to the far bank, got changed and got out the GPS. We managed to figure that we must have descended the next canyon west of our planned canyon and the GPS soon confirmed our mistake. Hence Navigator Canyon….

Strolling the short walk along a good path on the true left of the Whakapapa, we arrived back at my car. Walking up the 4WD track to get Brendans wagon, we carefully navigated our way to the start of the original canyon, only to find it chocked with bush. Perhaps another project for the future, but one that would require a bit more enthusiasm than Navigator Canyon…