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You are here: Home / Archives for Ahaura River

Ahaura River

Christmas 2021

January 2, 2022 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

For Christmas this year, we decided to go on a picnic at Jim’s Hut, about a half-hour drive east of here, up the Ahaura River. Our boys have been there a lot of times, hunting, and Gayle has been there once, but the rest of us hadn’t seen it yet. I got a picnic ready, and we headed off, in two vehicles. Our van wouldn’t make it up the track, so Simon and Elijah each drove his 4WD. We got almost to the turn-off to Jim’s Hut—and Simon turned off the other way, onto a two-track going into the bush. It turned out, once we got together again and heard the story, that James had heard about this track (at least he thinks it was this one!), and they decided to explore something new! Here we are, following Simon’s Pajero. He wanted to use his kayak in the river, so he had a trailer on behind. These pictures were taken through the windscreen of Elijah’s Rav4, while we were bumping around.IMG_0246IMG_0247

Mudholes don’t faze that truck!IMG_0248

These ruts, however, were a different story. The reason for the blurriness is that we were being thrown around a lot. I think this was a few seconds before we stopped and all piled into the Pajero, leaving the Rav behind. Just ahead, the track got even rougher, with gullies at least two feet deep to navigate. Simon did very well, and the Pajero performed beautifully; I held on tightly!IMG_0249

The end of the line—Simon decided he wouldn’t try going through this creek, because the bank on the other side went up too steeply. The track goes on, but we decided not to walk it this time.IMG_0250IMG_0251

The bush is beautiful back there! I couldn’t possibly record the colors of the ferns, or the cool dampness, or the sound of the rushing water. You’ll just have to imagine!IMG_0252

Simon found a dead tree right away, and his trusty hatchet came in useful. Soon, we were treated to the sight of a tree crashing down into the ravine.IMG_0253IMG_0254

We laid out the picnic on the trailer, and had lunch, then packed up, got turned around, and went back out to the main road.IMG_0257

Finally, we were on the track to Jim’s Hut…and there was a tree across it. Out came the hatchet again!IMG_0258

The Ahaura River in front of Jim’s Hut.IMG_0260

Elijah tried fishing, but when someone is swimming in the same place, it doesn’t work very well. Several of the boys ended up swimming across the river and back.

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The boys often take this cage across the river.IMG_0261Some of us walked down to Jim’s Flat. It’s an open meadow surrounded by thick bush.IMG_0262

Looking upstream, to the mouth of the Ahaura Gorge…IMG_0263

…and downstream.

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The girls wanted a ride over the river in the cage, so Simon and James obliged.

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The kayak made a couple of trips up the gorge.

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One more picture… I took this on our way out, going from home toward the mountains. Notice the bales of hay? Whoever mowed the roadsides baled it, too!

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Filed Under: Away From Home Tagged With: Ahaura River, Christmas

A Flooded River, and Mountains

October 5, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We have had a lot of rain lately. One day, someone told us the river was quite high, so Esther and the younger ones walked down to take a look at it. It was up at least a meter higher than usual at that point. (Last week when we went down to the riverbed for a picnic, there was evidence that it had been a couple of meters higher than normal at some point recently!) We live about a quarter of a mile from the river, and could hear it roaring loudly from here. Usually, you can see a wide stretch of rocks here, going about halfway across the river.

02-IMG_233003-IMG_233504-IMG_233705-IMG_234006-IMG_2350 Two weeks ago, we went “over the hill” to visit friends in Canterbury. Soon after we got over Lewis Pass, we had people feeling carsick, so stopped along this river for several minutes to let tummies settle down. It was so beautiful! Such a clear, blue sky and clean air, and the snow in the distance.

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This was after we got out of the mountains, and I was looking back.13-IMG_6022

We enjoyed seeing this herd of Belted Galloways. Those calves were so cute! I wish the light had been better, but this was the best I could do for a photo.14-IMG_6025

We very much enjoyed two days of meetings with our church family over there. I took this photo just before we left, while I was sitting in the van feeding the baby. It was hard to leave!15-IMG_6029

Going home—more snow-capped mountains!16-IMG_6033

Several months ago, I wrote a review about a science program we were using. I just got an email that they have a new resource available, free. It looks really good, and a lot of fun. There are heaps of video lessons in it, and if they are anything like the ones we watched from this company already, we’ll learn a lot from them and be fascinated at the same time. I look forward to enjoying these soon! Go to the landing page for the Mighty Feathers Science Goodie to see what you think. If you like the course and want to subscribe to other topics, use this link, and enter the code loh12 for $5.00 off your purchase. I’d like to know what you think of the Mighty Feathers course, if you try it out!

Filed Under: Away From Home Tagged With: Ahaura River, Flooding, Mountains, Travel

Jet Boat Race

November 3, 2018 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Thursday morning, a friend called to tell us that there was a jet boat race happening on the Grey River, and the boats would finish at the bridge over the Ahaura River just down the hill from us. She gave us the times they would be taking off on each of their three trips up and down the river, and sure enough, we soon heard the first round arriving. The second round started arriving shortly before lunch, so we took off down to the river to watch. We were a couple hundred meters past the finish line, so they were slowing down, but we enjoyed watching them shoot under the bridges and stop just upstream from us.

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After all the boats had arrived here, we walked down stream to wait for them to take off again. When we reached the finish/start line, we learned that it would be another 20 minutes, so we went farther and found a good spot to settle down right at the water’s edge. It was a beautiful, sunny day, and the river bottom was so lovely, with bright yellow gorse and broom flowers all over. Yes, those shrubs are a terrible nuisance, but this time of year they are gorgeous!

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Once the race started again, we enjoyed watching 19 boats go past. They left about a minute apart, and we could see the spray going up behind them for about 30-45 seconds, for maybe a mile around a couple of bends in the Grey River.

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I tried to get a video to show the speed, and did get a few seconds—but then the batteries in my camera died.

 Here are the few seconds of video I got.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFYM_GUcf28&w=560&h=315]
And there you have it–our impromptu field trip this week!

Chautona Havig’s free Kindle book this week is 31 Kisses. I enjoyed it, but didn’t write a review; it’s kind of a “fluffy” book—not a lot to it. It’s just clean, fun romance.

Filed Under: Away From Home Tagged With: Ahaura River, Field Trip

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