Track Diversion Proposal

Not long after the track upgrade a few years ago, the sea began washing away a section of trail, just before the last set of steps which climb up out of the bush to the clifftop at the south end of Karepiro Bay.

At the last FOOB committee meeting, Keith Gell from DOC told us that a diversion has recently been marked, and suggested we check it out.

Jonathan Baskett, one of the FOOB trapping team emailed this morning to report:

It so happened that my Wednesday walking group chose the OBW yesterday to walk on. So I took the opportunity to look at the track diversion that Keith from DOC mentioned at our last meeting.

The diversion is marked out with pink tape on trees. It is the sensible and obvious solution. It cuts across the corner of the track along the estuary where it starts the climb to the ridge, as the hypotenuse of the triangle.

We had to scramble through a lot of supplejack to get along the new route but not that far before it rejoined the original track about 55m up from the beginning of the climb. One of our walking group is a botanist and he was happy that no important trees would be compromised.

So my recommendation is that we thank Keith and give the diversion our approval.

I ran up to Dacre Cottage this afternoon with my camera to have a look for myself. Thanks to the efforts of the pest eradicators, I enjoyed being serenaded by tui and riro-riro (grey-warblers).

I agree that the proposed diversion seems to be the obvious solution.

I imagine it will require a set of steps, because it climbs quite steeply. It will join the existing steps right beside the monster pururi tree.