Longwoods Ranges

Waking early after my impromptu stayover in the mine-studded forests of Longwood, I made plans to get the hell out. Hopelessly lost and off path, and map seeming worse than useless, I breakfasted on chocolate and made the decision to head east. East was out, at any rate. So, with the helpful warnings of the Colac Bay pub-goers in my mind (“don’t get off track, there are old mines 50 foot deep you can plunge to your screaming death into”) I set off – being very careful about where I put my feet.

In a stroke of luck that I still can’t understand (having very stupidly wandered lost for a good hour the night before) within the hour I had stumbled onto the PWR track again. Unfortunately, it was a bit I’d already travelled – which meant that I still had the path of confusion before me. You’d think it would be fairly easy to follow a bloody great ditch, even when the path petered out, wouldn’t you? But if the thing is clogged, or there’s been a slip, or the path is for some reason impassable and you have to force your way through the bush around it and somehow hope for the best, well, things happen.

Coming again to the mystery spot, I somehow stumbled on the correct path. You see, you get to this river. On one side is a path that has obviously – from the state of the path itself, which is quite evident – led many unsuspecting people off into darkness and terror, while the real route, marked with a small scrap of cloth, is on the other side of the river, heading up a steep and overgrown bank with no evidence of a path at all. Again, it was force and hope – a theme to be repeated through much of the afternoon.

Then, stumbling along, a miracle. Cascade Road (a deserted farm track) appeared through the trees. No signage, of course. (And what Southlanders have against decent signage I don’t know – did it get them to a mother-in-law’s birthday party on time? – but there is apparently an immoveable regional grudge against it.) 31 hours after I started that supposedly 8 hour track I stumbled free of it, with a determined resolve never to take any Te Araroa guidelines seriously in future. 8 hours, bullshit.

I stumbled up Cascade towards Martin’s Hut, only to find that the promised clear signage was non-existent. I eventually found the track to Turnbull Hut, but only because the sign had not been removed entirely. Rather, it had been broken off and thrust head first into a gorse bush of gargantuan proportion. 1/2 hour to the hut, it said, and again: bullshit. I arrived 2 hours later, muddy to the bone, just as it was getting too dark to see, and you know what?

Turnbull Hut was worth it to the core.

I had high hopes for today. I thought it would be an interesting experience. Well, it was an interesting experience alright.

First, I had to tramp the 4 km or so of roading to get to Round Hill road, the entrance to the Long Hilly Track – which is neither long nor very hilly. The LHT is a historic walk through the bush site of old goldfields much favoured by the Chinese immigrants of the time. What was once a thriving little community – including hotels and pubs – is now gone, but there are some traces of the mining operations left. It’s a 2 hour return track, and is extremely well done, with information panels dotted around the place to tell you about its history. A lovely little walk.

About 45 minutes up, I came to the Port Water’s Race turn-off. PWR is a marvel of engineering – roughly 25 miles long (back before sensible metric) this finely sloping ditch channelled water for sluicing. Its gradient is so minimally perfect that the water moved slowly and easily through the bush, with no rushing or rapids – and for it to be hacked out of the earth and stone at the time (even tunneling through rock in some places) was no mean feat for poverty-stricken miners of the 19th century. Remnants of their presence are scattered along the track – like this old broken bridge.

A sign at the beginning of PWR assured me that the section to Cascade Road should take me 8 hours. I don’t know what roadrunner did this trail in 8 hours, but it must have been in better condition then! Mud, mud everywhere, broken trees and debris all over the path, and – it has to be said – a very lackadaisical attitude to marking said path or giving any signage at all meant that, close to 12 hours after I started walking PWR I had to camp out under the shelter of an enormous dead tree, completely lost.

At least it wasn’t raining and I had the sense to bring supplies, but still. Was not amused. Thank goodness no bears or other nasties in NZ! I might have been grumpy, but at least I could go to sleep secure in the knowledge that, like Granny Weatherwax, the most dangerous thing in those woods was me.

Tag: Longwoods Ranges

Port Water’s Race, still