Richmond Hills. Organiser: Alison Nicoll

Trampers: - David Neal; David Blunt; Dave Familton; David Nicoll; Ruth Hesselyn; John Olykan; Mark Graesser; Grahame Harris; Ana Christian; Alison Nicoll [organiser].

This close to home tramp began from Alison and David Nicoll's property in Hill St with the group walking the short distance along Hill Street to the Jimmy Lee Creek entrance to the Native Gully walkway - easy to miss the entrance unless you are looking for it. The beginning of the walkway has been planted in native plants, such as flaxes, pittosporum, totara, kowhai, grasses and cabbage trees, by volunteers over the last few years and these efforts are now paying dividends. The mostly shady walk, winding along a well formed but narrow track, winds up beside the pleasant-sounding stream flowing gently down beside the track and here the bush is mostly Whitey wood and Titoki with undercover of Kawa kawa and ferns. Several alternative routes are avoided and we stuck close to the stream. After about 30 minutes we reached a turn-off which was spotted first by Ruth's trusty Cairn, Skye, and began the steeper part of the tramp where the track was less defined and marked only by Venetian blind markers attached to some trees. Skye proved invaluable in leading the tramp from this point onwards and was determined to be the first to the top! Grahame took over the rear guard providing support and encouragement for those who were surprised at the grade 1 tramp starting to look like a grade 4! However it wasn't for very long and we broke out through the trees to find ourselves on Fowler Road - a 4 wheel drive forestry track. We stopped for a leisurely morning tea before crossing the road and continuing up the now steep stream bed with boulders and into the pines. A final steep fling and we were on the top. We had left at 9.15am and were up top by 11.30am. Alison had pre-arranged a visit to the forestry look-out and, Mike, the ranger there, told us about his lifestyle living on top of the hill - horrendous winds - fantastic views and constant monitoring of the surroundings for signs of smoke or fire. Mike has been there 12 years, so is not daunted by the lifestyle at all. We had lunch on the tops on a sheltered knoll as there was a very cold wind from the south and the cloud was low - so no signs of the Mt. Richmond group who were tramping in what looked like low cloud so no view for them towards Nelson either. Our route down followed the firebreaks and then along Fowler Road for an easy walk. We then rejoined the native gully track and eventually came out at Presto's creek entrance back onto Hill St. Back at the cars at 2pm - time for a quick look at the last of the irises - Skye had time to flush a rabbit before home in time to do other things.