Patarau Family Trip

Ok this one is unedited! The library I'm at is about to close so I'm posting it au naturelle. Get ready for some caving partying good times at Patarau!

The road turned from pavement to dirt at its Northern zenith in the Golden Bay. I was now driving south on the west coast of the South Island. The destination was Patarau Family trip of the Nelson Speleological Group. I was told that a bunch of cavers from all over New Zealand would be there to cave, kayak, waterslide, and have a general good time. Driving down the dirt road the rain forest turned to paddock land. Holes started to become visible in the sides of hills. Large limestone rocks were scattered about the country side like huge scoops of ice cream that had fallen off their cones. This was undoubtedly cave country.

I pulled into the paddock and parked the Oddity next to Leo’s urban assault. Leo is a caver from Nelson who has retired from his contracting business and has been outfitting a camper to go to Australia. This camper is a utilitarian beast of a Nissan.

Getting out I saw that a truly enormous camp was going in next to me. Leo was in the process of setting up his hot tub and the rest of the family was setting up tents. Little comments were going from person about how they were setting up tents improperly and the usual ribbing of a family that is truly happy to be in each other’s company. This was the Patarau Family Trip. Pretty soon people from the NSG, CCG, MSG, and west coast started showing up. Kids were running around playing and Leo was looking at a hill with a gleam in his eye. This hill would be transformed into a waterslide. A bunch of us took an old plastic NZ rugby sign and laid it out on the hill. After staking it down we proclaimed the job done. I then helped Leo and his people fix and fill the hot tub.

I was a bit winded after all the work so I sat down. No sooner did I do this than I felt a cool sensation slide down my neck. A Tui beer landed in my left hand and a smiling Leo walked by me to the next chair. Not a bad way to start the trip.

Soon friends like Kevin and Jane showed up and tents started going up. Jane has me in gentleman training for the benefit of Ellen upon my return. She made this all too clear when she got there and said “woman carrying heavy fruit over there.” I was obviously supposed to take the hint and help carry the fruit. This sort of ribbing was starting to work and I went around helping people put up tents and move kayaks.

Dinner the first night found me cooking some mac and cheese over a small cook stove. From across the paddock I heard the voice of Kevin yelling “Dan!” I walked over to be greeted by a grinning Kevin with some fajitas. After scarfing that down I helped Kevin with the dishes.

After a long day of driving I went to the Oddity and promptly passed out. The next morning I woke up and went to find Jane. A rule of thumb is that if caving is what you want to achieve, find Jane. I did this was rewarded with a trip going out to a couple of caves within walking distance, Tunnel cave and Little cave. Tunnel cave was much like a big straight tunnel though a mountain. Little cave was a highly decorated cave that was much longer than Tunnel. Sam and Bridge, a couple of newish but highly skilled Nelson Cavers came along with one CCG member (Name escapes me, Andria?).  The trip was great and had lots of fun squeezes and very pretty entrances.

We walked back to the camp to find that the water slide was in full swing. I saw Leo coming down surrounded by a bunch of laughing children. Immediately Jane said oh I want to try that and we went running up the hill. Adults and children alike were partying on the waterslide and those who weren’t doing were having a very good time watching. Again Kevin called me over to have dinner with him and the kids, chicken tikimasala.

I found a guy named Tom from the North Island who was keen on Geo Caching. I had a geo coin that needed a home from home so I went with him. We walked out to the lake and found the geo cache. Enter the MSG.

The next day I woke up and started walking around and saying good morning to everyone. Much to my surprise there was a North Carolinian! We talked about home for sometime and I moved on to find Tom and the MSG again.

I found them and we got to talking about caving. They invited me on their trip for the day. It was a cave called Crieghton’s up near the Patarau River. This was a “dry” cave, which in NZ means you don’t HAVE to swim. The cast of characters going through the cave reminded me of home. There was a new caver, Caroline. She was competent but needed help with certain things. A guy named Collin had the map and was made game of as is customary of a path finder. Jean (I think) had a Petzel ayrian carbide lamp. It was a really good lamp and I’m seriously considering buying one now. Paul and Tom were going on in a witty hilarious banter. Ivan was the strong silent type that didn’t talk unless he had something to say; nevertheless he was quite humorous.

Adding myself to this band was a really fun plan. It reminded me of caving with VPI with the ribbing and humorous conversation. We were leaving the cave and everyone else was buffoon sumped at a climb. I realized I needed a bath so I went under which involved a horrible duck under in a stream. Coming out of the water on the other side I felt much cleaner and got the satisfaction of surprising Collin. I didn’t realize it but this won me some street credit around camp later.

After coming back Collin was approached by his wife who told us to go get mussels from the beach. We had a couple of dark beers and went to the beach. As the tide went out on the limestone rocks, a huge colony of blue-lipped mussels was revealed. We took a bunch of the biggest ones and jumped around on the rocks looking at cool fish and formations.

On our return Kevin had a steak waiting for me. I had a good time talking with him and the kids about their day. As we were eating a procession went up the hill from Leo’s campsite. Leo and a bunch of kids were taking cardboard cutouts up the hill. This was the sunset brigade. The cutouts made silhouettes against the sunset. They were things like kangaroos and the Sydney Opera House. Leo was getting ready to go to “Oz” so he was doing this for the last time for a long while. Over the years Leo and the kids have done such scenes as the Mad Hatter’s Table and the evolution of man (ending with the caver) against the sunset. He came down with a tear in his eye as the kids played around the silhouettes.

The next day I went with the MSG cavers again. The cave of the day was Prouses cave. The map we were given was defective and we ended up going up the hill and entire wrong valley. This being Patarau we actually discovered a very old and pretty cave that had not been discovered. We didn’t bother doing too much there and went back down the hill to Prouses.

Collin and Jean found the lower entrance followed by Ivan, Tom and me. In the words of Alex Booker, Tom and I had a lot of quit in us. When we got to the cave this was replaced with zeal for caving as we went through this wet but cool cave. As we were walking up the borehole Ivan kept saying “Collin! The cave is bidirectional.” The rest of us found this really funny. When we got to the upper entrance it was raining so we went back in the cave. We went down the cave and found a huge ceiling passage. We all split up to get through the breakdown. Every caver being experienced, we got up through it using separate routes. We knocked around up there for a while looking at glowworms.

After a while we decided it was time to go home and left. The sea was getting up as we went back to the car and salt was blowing over everything. When we got back I went to eat with Kevin yet again.

All this time I though I had been taking and giving nothing back. I was thinking what I could give all these people that had shown me such kindness. I realized I had something awesome to give! I whipped out my sax and walked to the fire. All the kids came over and were requesting a bunch of songs ranging from “You Are My Sunshine”, which is Grandma Patsy’s favorite song, to Adele songs.

Then Moira came over. She is an older caver from Christchurch and she told me how she had been to Luray caverns and how she had loved the Valley so much when she was there. She wanted to know if I could play “Shenandoah.” I played it with variations for about five minutes. She really seemed pleased with me after that. All the kids were sitting around requesting songs for about an hour and a half.

Then Deb, wife of Oz the president of the NZSS, said we might have to be on alert for a rescue. Uh-oh. We got all ready to go up to Bulmer cave where some cavers had gone through a hole that had sumped out. I was very impressed with the way the NZSS cavers handled the situation. The organization was really something.

The next morning the farmer came down from his house to tell us that they got out on their own. This was also the last day of Patarau. I packed up and offered to have Tom ride out to Collingwood. We geo cached our way out to the farewell spit where the MSG cavers and I went for a nice walk on the beach.

Leo’s last Patarau was an experience I’ll not soon forget. Kids running around, awesome scenery and caves galore was the order of the day. Now I’ve got itchy feet and I hear there’s a job on the North Island for me. I wonder if the Oddity floats?