Area: Mt Watkin (North of Dunedin City)

We left the clubrooms just after 9 am on a beautiful clear morning and headed up the northern motorway for a short distance before we turned off inland toward Bucklands Crossing, just before the old Cherry Farm hospital. We headed over the rolling hills and soon we were parked up next to the Waikouaiti River, having nearly got some mud on Alan's 4WD!

We put our boots and packs on and headed upstream, soon we could see Mt Watkin in the distance and it looked like a good day's walk ahead of us. We soon came to a stream crossing and all tried our best to keep our feet nice and dry, I didn't seem to have much luck. We were going to do a loop, walking up the west of Mt Watkin and returning down a ridge on the east of the mountain. Robyn took us up through a track where it was going to be more attractive and not as man‑made as the bull­dozer track below. This was funny because soon we were walking through a field of swedes, but the views just got better and better.

We had a rest up in the swedes and had a chocolate biscuit or two. It was a beauti­ful day with a clear sky and no wind, we could see for miles. A top dressing plane was giving a dramatic air display and we worked out that the plane was only on the ground for about 2 minutes, then it would be away with another load. Soon we were scrambling up the loose but large rocks on the side of Mt Watkin and we had great views down onto the rock glaciers.

Lunch time on the top and we got our cameras out and took in the great views of Mt Cargill, the Heads of the Otago Harbour, Mt Charles, north toward Palmerston, over to the mountains near Naseby and Ranfurly, and also a great view of the Rock and Pillar Range, We had a great lunch stop and were soon heading down on the oppo­site side to where we came up. In no time we were back down in the valley enjoy­ing the last sun of the day. Thanks to Robyn Bridges for leading us on a great 6 hour round trip.

Chris Dyson on behalf of Alan Thomson. Phil Keene. Laurel Dunn, Janet and Gavin MacArthur. Ken Mason, Jill Dodd, Jacob Feenstra and Robyn Bridges

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