How far would you go?

I saw two tents at Slab Hut Creek this morning, I’ll add, this cold morning. Almost lunchtime and the grass was still crunchy kind of cold. I can’t say I spent long out of the car, even my teeth were cold. I’ll call them brave souls.

5 Likes

I remember panning and sluicing in the Shotover in the middle of Winter. I had to trudge in through some snow drifts, got down to the rivers edge that was all in shade for most of the day. The gravel was frozen solid so had to work in the waters edge. Every splash of water would freeze instantly on the stones and was even freezing on the legs of my pants!! I had thick cotton gloves that went inside thick PVC gloves but even then I would have to stop every half an hour to spin my arms around to get the warm blood back into the finger tips!!
Sometimes we’re only granted a particular day and time, be it from mother nature, work or the wife so you find yourself taking that day regardless of the toll. I don’t think I got much more than a half gram but it’s a tale I’ll tell for a very long time and sometimes that’s enough.

3 Likes

I remember driving down to the Shotover River at the Oxenbridge Tunnel to do some sluice boxing & the river was almost frozen right across. Needless to say the river was very low & there was no chance of setting up the sluice box. So I high tailed it out of there. It was lethal just trying to walk on the rocks.

JW :cowboy_hat_face:

1 Like

Looks like the shotover crowd will be hightailing it to slab hut because they saw a sliver of sunshine. The water definitely flows. I wasn’t going to stop but one of the people I had met earlier that morning when working spoke highly of the site, and apparently the pizza oven is worth it. Spring perhaps.

1 Like