Whitewater Action In Murchison

As term one drew to a close and the days began to get shorter, 13OED headed to Murchison for some whitewater kayaking action. Although the river was at its lowest flow in several years, the team found plenty of classic rapids to run, waves to surf and even a waterfall to hang out under.



Competing for wave space - experience wins out!



Ritchie on the Matakitaki River.





Phillip and Salem carving it up on the front wave at O'Sullivans.


Pulling out the old skool moves - shudder rudder.

Last of the Winter Snow

The rare and endangered Native Snow Goblin.

Year 13OED managed to sneak in to the mountains during a gap in an extended period of poor weather recently. With the avalanche risk high in Nelson Lakes National Park we stayed closer to home around the Mt Arthur region. The plan was to snow camp for two nights close to the base of the mountain and summit the North Twin. The weather played its hand though, and for the first time in over seven years, we cut the trip short by a day. The crew did get the chance to experience snow caving though as the pics show.


Tess showing the boys that you can make gourmet food in the mountains. Pasta pesto and fresh rocket anyone?


Jay and Zac go for the dehydrated approach


Digging in


Home sweet home. A cosy 1 degree above zero



Josh and Willy doing their bit for New Zealand reading week

Greenlink Cave

Term two has seen Year 13 OED served up a steady diet of ropes, hardware, gumboots and dark places. The caving unit always rates as a favorite for most students and 2009 is no exception. Weeks of training in the use of SRT (single rope technique) has given students the skills to begin exploring the amazingl caving opportunities the local area provides. Greenlink cave offers a great introduction to vertical caving and on a beautiful sunny Friday we descended into the dark and wet of the spelunkers world to put new skills to test. Here's a quick tour of the first 200m of Greenlink, albeit without the aid of camera lighting rigs.

4 Rivers Plain Kayaking Trip

Year 13 students travelled to Murchison, a small rural township two hours south of Motueka for three days of paddling recently. Murchison is a mecca for whitewater kayaking with a range of rivers that keep all paddlers from novice to expert entertained and is home to the famous New Zealand Kayak School.
Rapid running, eddy turning, wave surfing, capsizing, rolling and the occasional swim were the standard operating procedures for the trip.

Check out the video for a taster of the action. Thanks Zac and Ryan for musical inspiration.



Several of the rivers in the Murchison area are under threat damming for hydro power, if you are concerned by this click here for an interesting article by the New Zealand Recreational Canoeing Association.






http://rivers.org.nz/system/files/NZCanoeing_2008_2.pdf