With no Winch Challenge events to look forward to thanks to COVID-19 members of the Nelson 4WD Club put their rigs to good use on a recent trip to the West Coast. Vicky Newport has the story.

2020 is a year we will all remember and talk about for a long time I am sure.  Covid-19 hit and it hit us fast.  I won’t go on about it as I’m sure we are all but over talking about it at the moment.  

I am a supermarket worker so my life didn’t change too much apart from having hubby Scotty hanging around the house all day. So when Level 2 came in and we got the all clear to leave our region it didn’t take long to organise a few fellow four-wheel drivers and head to Reefton. With a long weekend very close we organised it around that.  

With the Mainland Winch Challenge Series canned for 2020 we had four winch trucks that had been  parked up and ready for action.  All being members of the Nelson 4WD Club we also thought it would be a great opportunity to see if any of the tracks in Reefton would still be suitable for club trips. 

The line-up

First up there was obviously Scotty Newport and myself in the Yellow Jeep, running a Superwinch.  The Jeep had had  a wee bit of maintenance thrown at it over the summer months  plus a fresh coat of paint.  

Then there was Rowan Coutts and Phil Thompson in Rowan’s newly-built black Jeep, running a Comeup Winch.  Rowan started this build about 18 months ago and was set to enter the winch challenges this season.

Scotty and Rowan would normally enter in the Open Class at events. 

Also in a black Jeep but in this case running a Runva 9500q Winch, were Jamie Gilbert and Hamish McKercher.  A totally new truck, Jamie had to do a few quick jobs to get ready for the Reefton weekend. His Jeep has minimal external bars for protection and Jamie entered in the Invitational Class at events in his old truck. 

And a wee Suzuki

Regular readers might remember the story of John and Tyra Boylet and their wee white Suzuki, now running a Talon Superwinch, from last year’s Superwinch Mainland Winch Challenge write-ups.

For those who don’t this Suzuki was totally rebuilt after round one of last year’s Challenge.  It took John about two months but they were back by the third round. Dedication!

All four trucks were running 35" tyres so hopefully the tracks wouldn’t be too rutted out.  

A couple of the trucks headed to Reefton on the Friday night with the other two leaving Nelson early Saturday morning.  The weather couldn’t have been better, typical West Coast weather from our experience, in fact; a bit foggy in Reefton itself but two kms down the road it was sunny and hot. Lucky we all were all wearing thermals eh?  

We were heading out of Reefton around 10:30am, two trucks driving and the others being towed to our rendezvous point where those who had to unload did so, and off we went.

Saturday tracks

The first track on our ‘wish list’ was Trev’s Hill, where we all had to winch through the first big bog.  Up the big climb and nearly to the top with Scotty in the front... Jamie had to winch the last wee bit, but Rowan and John drove it. 

After this we headed back down to the start of Kooze’s Track.  This track is a bit of a (sh.t) hole but its challenging and we expected a bit of panel damage.  Scotty was again leading the team through and in doing so basically cleared out the bogs and – after winching  a truck or two through, went from Lead Truck to Tail End Charlie in the process!

True to its reputation the track took some souvenirs too;  the first bog claimed Jamie’s side mirror,  then on the last winch out his winch rope snapped.  Between them though, Rowan and Scotty spliced it back together and it held out for the rest of the weekend. Once we reached the top it was lunchtime so we sat around in the sun and counted ourselves lucky, because there wasn’t as much damage as we had anticipated.

Saddle Up!

Lunch over and we headed up Saddle Track. This track was probably best suited for bigger tyres than we had but that didn’t deter the team. Half way up, and after the first winch there was a bit of digging and placing of dead logs in the ruts, which made a huge difference to the track.  It was drivable after a bit of labour.  

By this stage Scotty was probably cursing me as I like to take photos before running the winch rope for him. To be honest he is probably quicker driving and running his own rope, hooking it up and getting back in the driver’s seat and winching himself out than having me sorting it all out. I can unhook him tho haha. Plus he had to keep getting out my window so it was lucky I was taking photos. 

Anyhoo. We all got to the top of Saddle Track around 3.00pm.  Do we do another track or is it beersies time? Nope, it was off to another track. 

Oh dear!

Near the Quarry (I think it was Maori Gully), however, one of Jamie’s front tyres started to lose air.  He decided he would call it a day, change the tyre and head to the accommodation back in Reefton and sort it out before Sunday.  The last thing I said was, "Don’t forget your radio is sitting on your tyre,"  and we left them. 

At the next track Rowan drove up on the right-hand side, which was quite steep, next in John and Tyra. Both parties got half way then had to winch, prompting Scotty  to take the left-hand track only to belly out. Speaking of bellies, he was lucky he lost weight during lockdown as he had a tight squeeze out his window to sort the winch rope.

Once he sorted us out though we all met at the top, having done ‘the loop’ pretty easily.  Meaning that NOW it was time for a nice cold beverage and dinner back at our accommodation at the Dawson’s Hotel.  There Jamie and Hamish were busy fixing the tyre; or rather the three tyres which needing attention... but minus a radio!  

Sunday:

We were up bright and early for a 9.00 am start on Sunday morning, leaving Reefton and heading  towards Ikamatua.   A couple of tracks were on the agenda today.  Firstly we would do the Chasm.  Because two of us were trailering we decided to do it from north to south and back again. 

This is a very popular track but a couple of our team hadn’t done it before.  About halfway through Scotty lost a tyre valve but that was a quick fix thanks to a valve John had in the glove box of his truck.

Those who know the track would understand that  there is usually a bit of winching.  We got through to the South end and stopped for lunch OK though, and for the whole day, in fact, with four trucks we only had to do two winches; which was not too bad, no too bad at all!   

One more track

With a wee bit of time up our sleeve there was one more track we wanted to do – into the Alexander Mine.  Scotty had been told DOC had been in there and done some work which turned out in our favour.  They had upgraded the track in as far as the river.  From there we had to bounce up the river for a bit until we found a track on the other side as the original one had been washed out.  This allowed us to drive nearly all the way to the old Power Station.  Though there is not much left there now.  

Back down the track we stopped at the "Edward Roaster" (a low rectangle of bricks) structure  This has deteriorated a bit since we were last there with the Club.  The old cyanide tanks have now been fenced off but is still visible. 

From there we headed back to Reefton. With no  truck issues for anyone it was a good day. Just to be different we had dinner that night at Wilson’s Hotel where we caught up with a few Winch Challenge competitors from Christchurch who had been to Seddonville for the weekend.  

Monday: 

Monday being  a public holiday brought with it a bonus half a day today before we all headed home.  There was no sleep in however, thanks to another 9.00am start. There would also be no John and Tyra, the pair deciding to hang with their Suzuki mates for the day; mainly because there was a track they wanted to do that we weren’t keen on doing.  

So, our remaining trio headed up Big River Road, with Jamie and Hamish choosing to run on ahead to see if they could find the radio they had misplaced.  

Sure enough, as the rest of us waited for them they radioed in... which was great to hear as it not only meant that they had found it, it also meant it was still charged.

Lucky!

Petrol Hill was the first track we bounced up, bringing memories flooding back of the last time I was in there, a teams’ event two or three years ago.  You are basically driving or bouncing your way up a creek! In saying that, there is one good bog before Petrol Hill which we all winched through. This time though, no-one even attempted to drive the hill. None of us wanted to push our luck being so close to the end of a good weekend.  

Once out of there we did a bit of exploring and walking.  Scotty is a very knowledgeable man when it comes to West Coast history so there’s always something we have to stop and look at.  

We drove around Will Claim for about an hour.  There are quite a few tracks in there to play on, as well as an old man-made open cast mine and part of a dam which we stopped at.   

It was 12 pm when we arrived back in Reefton so we thought it would be rude not to stop in the local cafe for lunch.  

Great company, great tracks

Overall we had an awesome weekend.  Great company and cheers to Reefton for their hospitality.  The town was full of four-whee drives and bicycles.  It was great to see the town humming.  

Of all the tracks we did there were probably only two that we would call grade 3 and wouldn’t  be suitable to take our club on with most of our club members still running 33-inch tyres.  

That said, with the Mainland Winch Challenge Series cancelled this year I know we will be out and about a lot more doing private trips like this one which I really enjoy because I not only get to sit in the co-driver’s seat, I get to write and photograph them for you!