Ore Stream, Haast Pass

With very low water conditions, great warm weather and a strong team, we made a descent of Ore Stream in the Haast Pass Area.

Being DIDYMO aware. Shoes off for crossing the Makarora River..

Jethro enters the slot

There are several difficult jumps in this canyon. Getting to the launch point requires careful scrambling above nasty water features. The launches are exposed and sometimes slippery. The landings are narrow and the hieghts are in the 5-8m mark. Tricky stuff, but always faster and safer than trying to rappel the waterfalls themselves...

Toine makes the first rap


Plenty of water on R2, and some delicate rappelling

Michi belays Nic whilst he raps to one side of the flow

This pool pours over the next drop, so even in low flow, you have to swim very hard accross the pool to make the eddy on river right... If you don't, you'll be the first to slide R3..

Scott on R3.

You end up in a cool cave behind the waterfall.

Toine jumped this one.. (mad europeans)

Scott in Ore Stream

Michi belays Scott out to the next anchor for the final rap.

Another spot to be careful, with potential for being flushed over the falls..

The last rappel.

I got a working 3/4 the way down the falls and got flipped upside down. Ended up behind the falls in a small pool for a minute or so whilst collecting my thoughts and figuring out what to do next... It doesn't look too bad, but still deserves considerable respect.

OR, you could just slide the thing on the TR like Scott did. Looks really sketchy, but turns out to be far more fun and probably safer than the absiel. Definately NOT for the faint hearted/inexperienced..

All done, wandering out back into the sunshine

Today's water conditions would probably count as 'moderate' at best, but overall conditions in the region had been very low for quite some time. Ore has a very large catchment area, and is only likely to come into condition in Feb/March. Even then, Ore has several very dangerous spots in normal water levels.