Clarence River Rafting, Kaikoura Ranges

Had an amazing 3 day Rafting trip down the Clarence River with the team from RNZAF Base Woodbourne.

I drove to Clarence (North of Kaikoura), dropped off my car then caught a lift with the guys all the way back to Hanmer Springs. From there, we drove over Jollies Pass to the confluence of the Acheron and Clarence rivers for the first night.

The weather was clear and cold but an evening fire kept the chills away..

There were 3 main gorges on the Clarence, with a bunch of grade 2 rapids. Mostly they were wave trains that would smash into the gorge wall as the river changed direction. A few were a little more exciting and a couple even nearly saw us flip.

Infact, one of the rafts did flip near the end of day two, but the only casualty was a lost camp chair that wasn't tied on..

The trip was fantastic, with lots of floating through incredibly scenic terrain. There were open valleys with views of incredible peaks and tight gorges with improbably steep rock walls and incredible strata.

Sunrise on the Clarence River

Our guide 'Dusty'

About to run 'The Chute' in the 1st Gorge

Dave's raft after negotiating the Chute

Amazing rock strata in the 1st Gorge

A 'Moeraki' boulder embedded in the bank

Rafting under the gaze of the Inland Kaikoura Peaks

Campsite at the end of day 2

Our Aussies (Luke and Sean) enjoy the float through the farmland on day 3

Dave's team paddling hard to avoid the wall

Woolshed Ck, Mt Sommers

We'd hoped for a descent on the previous sunday, but torrential rain and flooding rivers saw us call it off. But only two days later, the weather looked good enough to try again.

The rivers on the plains were all high, but running clear which gave us a bit of hope for the canyon. Walking up the track beside the lower river section, we began to have a few second thoughts..

We climbed over the small hill on the canyon rim, with great views out towards the Winterslow range, even spotting another canyon to do (Trifalls Stream). Having a snowball fight in your wetsuit before entering the canyon signalled to us that it might be a little chilly.. but hey, if the water is all frozen on the hills, there will be less in the canyon.

Trifalls Stream... on the tick list for this canyon season

Yes, that white stuff is snow and I'm about to go canyoning...

T he waterlevels in the canyon were reasonably high, but still manageable. Sections that were previously easy downclimbs were now whitewater. On several occaisons we spotted one another with throw bags and used a drift anchor to help negotiate one section.

One side stream entered the main canyon, creating wall to wall white water, with considerable usptream flow in one of the eddies. Powerful enough, that even with a strong jump and powerful swim, we couldn't cross the pool. Had to go behind the waterfall to keep in the green water in order to make it past.

The higher water made the canyon much more challenging and enjoyable. Normally you have to swim a few sections, but today we had to brace off the canyon walls occaisonally to slow us down as we zipped along downstream.

The slides were awesome with the extra flow and the walk out down the main river required attention to routefinding to avoid ending up in some nasty rapids..

We took heaps of video footage, hopefully a movie will appear on youtube soon. Thus, we hardly took any stills and the ones we did take were in the tame sections!

A great day out!

Second drop


Toine exits a calm section to look at the next rapid

Trying to catch some sun to keep warm

Matata Canyon, Hunters Hills, Sth Canty

Time for a 1st descent. We'd heard about a 'big waterfall' up behind the properties of one of the Farmers we'd spoken to during the first descent of Kaumira Canyon.

Today we returned in light drizzle and low vis for a look at the stream in the Matata Scenic Reserve. The kind Farmer offered us a lift up the farm tracks to drop us in at the head of the stream. Talk about luxury!!

The descent was pretty uneventful. There was one 3m drop right near the put in, but alas almost all the rest of the canyon was simply a rough boulder scramble.

The one redeeming feature of the trip was a very beautiful slot section with a 5m slide and 12m absiel about 2/3 the way through. This sequence was extremely beautiful, very fun and sadly rather brief.

We felt a little dissapointed overall with this trip, so went back to Kaumira to do the lower canyon for the afternoon.

Following a sheep track all the way into the stream

Showing promise at the first drop

Chucky has a go

Threatening to turn into a canyon..

Looking down the top of the slide (roped for scouting)

The beautiful drop

Kaumira Canyon

First Canyon of the season!!

Light rain was forecast, with cool southerly breezes; perfect canyoning weather. Though as Toine and I walked up the track, it was surprisingly sunny and warm. By the time we'd committed to the canyon the grey clouds returned and it started to drizzle.

The Canyon had more water than my last visit, but was still only a moderate flow. The only downside was the 9 dead sheep that we found in various states of decay on the descent!!

Route a Hoaire, Yate, New Caledonia

Last night I’d tried again and failed to get myself on a Canyoning trip, so for plan B I figured on doing another PR track out toward Yate, about 100km from Noumea. The drive was quite interesting, passing the 40 Sq km ‘Lac Yate’ which is the major source of hydro power for the island.

There was an adventure race called ‘Gigawatt’ on today, making the usually quiet road very busy indeed. Again the PR was well signposted, but the last 2km was a deeply rutted orange dirt road. We tried to smash the sump of the rental car, but unfortunately failed. Finding the ‘depart du sentier’ by the Yate Dam, I went on my way.

Yate Dam

Riviere Bleue

The first half of the track was along an old road that sidled precariously above the lower Yate Valley. Beneath the Hydro dam, the river was littered with large boulders and the occasional deep azure pool. Along the way I saw a Pitcher Plant as well as a rather large spider on its web. The Meina wia waterfall was rather impressivel; I stopped and admired it for several minutes.

Don't go swimming in the river...


Chucky on the Route a Hoaire

A curious (and rather large) local

Pitcher Plant

Riviere Bleue

Cascade De Mwiena

Yate Bay

When the Yate Bay and Hydro station came into view, I plonked myself down on a rock to have some lunch. From there, the route followed a short section of single track up towards another 4WD track. Better views of the Bay were gained as I climbed higher, but soon I was mostly enjoying wandering through weird and wonderful sections of scrub. I stopped often to look more closely at some of the curious plants and take photos.

Lac Yate

Lac Yate came into view next, with its many inlets and large numbers of dead bleached trees poking up through the waters. From here, it was a short wander back down to Jeff, who was waiting reading his book in the Car.

Mont Dore, New Caledonia

We had half a day spare during a work trip to New Caledonia and I’d eyed up a trip over a local hill to fill in the time. The tourist office had a bunch of pamphlets outlining tracks over the island with Mont Dore being the closest to Noumea. I managed to convince Nigel and Louisa to come with me on the trip, Nige for somewhere new to road cyle and Louisa for the walk. The Mont Dore track car park was well sign posted, being one of the ‘PR’ trails that are clearly designed to introduce trampers gently to the new environment. Nigel waived us good bye and we began to trudge uphill in the heat.

Well signposted info board

Dissapearing into the New Caledonian scrub

The track was well trodden and generally very well marked with orange and white stripes painted on rocks and trees along the way. Soon we’d risen above the ‘back yards’ of Mont Dore township and found ourselves climbing amidst low scrub and bright orange dirt. The higher we climbed the better the colours of the lagoon became. We could see many more reefs and sandbars than possible from sea level and it amazed us how shallow the lagoon appeared.

Climbing above Mont Dore township

Aiming initially for the little saddle shown



Chucky at the saddle

Heat radiated off the hard packed orange clay and we sweated buckets. Thankfully, we arrived at a little saddle after about 30mins of climbing to be greeted by a cool breeze. From the saddle we got our first views toward the interior of the island; range after range of dry forest and orange dirt.

Le Petit Mont Dore

The track followed the south-east ridge of Mont Dore, with some quite steep terrain on the slopes facing Noumea. On several occasions I side tracked a little to stand on top of small crags butting out above the face.

Summit plateau

Arriving suddenly on the gentle summit slopes, the terrain underfoot changed markedly. The plutonic rocks found on the ridge track had been replaced by orange and black volcanic ones. Though the PR did not lead directly to the summit, we made a short detour to the very top to soak in the views. Despite having to share the top with a huge set of radio dishes, the views were quite spectacular.




NC Cairns

Radio gear at the summit of Mont Dore

Descending down the North east flanks of the massif, we traipsed among large washouts and numerous slip faces. Here the mountain had been exploited for its Nickel deposits as one of New Caledonia’s first open pit mines. We gained the ‘old mining track’ and began the long series of switchbacks towards the ‘Col du Plum’ were our car had been left.

There were a couple of small sections of remnant dry forest on the descent, but mostly there was low scrub and plenty of erosion. We arrived at the car park, very satisfied with our journey and completing the ‘5hr’ track in bang on 3 hours.

Descending past the old mine