OLD MAN RANGE

Starting Points - Symes Road, Fruitlands and Waikaia Bush Road, Shingle Creek

The Old Man Range forms the south western boundary of the Manuherikia Basin. Named after the Old Man, a prominent skyline schist tor at 1,695m, the range extends 50km from the Fraser River in the north to the Umbrella Mountains in the south. Characterised by a smooth, tor-studded plateau-like crest, sub-arctic landforms, and distinctive high-altitude plants and insects (including miniature shrubs, flowering plants and giant wetas which freeze solid in the winter and thaw in the spring), the range is well worth a visit. Commercial tour operators run conducted trips onto the range. Private vehicle access is possible, but tracks are rugged and require some driving skill. Walking is recommended.

Road Access

Symes Road, 10km south of Alexandra, gives access to the TV transmitter and the Fraser Basin at the northern end of the range. The Waikaia Bush Road leads to the Potters/Campbells Gully goldfield at the south end of the range. Both roads are single lane, lightly metalled and steep. Beyond the second gate on the Waikaia Bush Road and the third gate on Symes Road, the surface is clay only. Use of these roads by ordinary cars is subject to the weather at all times. Both roads are normally negotiable between mid December and late March, but in some years snow drifts across the roads may not clear until late summer and the surface may never dry out enough for 2WD cars. If due caution is exercised, both roads should be negotiable on a fine summer day. It is not possible to take cars right through to Piano Flat on the Waikaia Bush Road.

Weather and Equipment

These walks are definitely fine weather only. The tops are subarctic, exposed to the wind, and can be very cold. It can (and does) snow at any time of the year. Temperatures are usually 4-10 degrees colder than at Alexandra. Always take a spare jersey, waterproof parka, gloves, hat and long trousers. Heavy boots are unnecessary. If venturing away from formed tracks a map and compass are essential. Cloud and mist is very disorientating on these tops.

Walking Times

Potters

• County shelter to Potters Huts 1/2 - 1 hour
• Huts to Waikaia/Campbells Junction 1 - 2 hours
• Junction to Potters via Campbells Creek 3 - 4 hours

Fraser Basin

• Transmitter Road to Fraser hut 1/2 hour
• Fraser Hut to Hyde Rock 2 - 3 hours
• Hyde Rock back to Transmitter Road 2 hours

Maps

1:50,000 G42, Alexandra and G43, Roxburgh. Available from Department of Conservation, Alexandra, and local booksellers.

References

• "Old Man Range Protected Natural Area Survey" - Department of Conservation
• "Alpine Plants of NZ" - AF Mark and Nancy Adams
• "Early Gold Discoveries in Otago" - Vincent Pyke
• "Hammer & Tap - The Story of the Tuapeka County" (for the history of the Waikaia Bush Road).
• "Outdoor Recreation in Otago" - Bruce Mason

Legal Access

Symes (Transmitter) Road and the Waikaia Bush Road are legal roads. The Potters/Campbells Gully area is public land, part of the "Bains Block" owned by the Department of Conservation.

Route Guide

Potter/Campbells Gully

As the road climbs notice the change in vegetation with altitude. Oversown pasture gives way to fescue tussocklands on the mid slopes and finally to true Alpine snow tussock. This end of the Old Man Range is noted for its alpine flowers, particularly the snowbank and alpine bog vegetation in the heads of the flanking valleys. The road passes through a boggy area before the summit where a ford may give trouble. Please respect the alpine bogs - they are fragile and have been damaged by trail bikes in places. On the summit is the remains of the original Tuapeka county shelter hut. The road then curves around the head-waters of the Pomahaka River to the "new" shelter hut. Notice the large metal snow pylons lining the road. Snow poles and shelter sheds were originally placed by the Otago provincial authorities in the 1860s to mark the route over the range from the Campbells Gully goldfield. In 1862 the miners were trapped by a heavy snowfall and over 30 died trying to break out. A memorial to them is found beside the main road at Gorge Creek. The poles and hut were re-erected by the Tuapeka County in the 1940s when the present road was upgraded.

From the shelter hut there is a fine view up the impressive glacial cirque (the head of a past glacial valley) at the head of Campbells Creek. A small terminal moraine left by the glacier encloses a swampy sphagnum/rush mossfield (an infilled lake) through which the creek wanders in a series of meanders and oxbow lakes. About 1km from the shelter hut is the turn off to Potters. Do not attempt to take ordinary cars beyond this point. The road to Piano Flat in the Waikaia is marginal even to 4WD vehicles due to swampy conditions over the next few kilometres. A short walk on a 4WD track leads to the Potters workings, the highest and most remote of all Otago's goldfields. Two well preserved stone huts can be used for an overnight stay. On the other side of the workings, on top of an isolated knoll is the "lone grave" - surely one of the loneliest in New Zealand. There is a magnificent view here of the plateau country of the Waikaia River head-waters, backed by the Garvie Mountains to the west. From the lone grave head west down a prominent spur, trending right, to the junction of the east branch of the Waikaia River and Campbells Creek. This is a route only, there is no marked track. The Waikaia is a clear green river running in a small gorge. Campbells Creek is now traversed back to Potters. The creek is gorgy and it is necessary to cross and re-cross to avoid bluffs and waterfalls. Every little flat has its ruined stone hut and gold workings, mainly stone wing dams and small tailings. A particularly fine group of stone huts and a large 200m long, 2m high wing dam is found at a bend in the stream, about 1/2km downstream from the Nuggety Gully junction. More small gorges are traversed until the creek opens out at the Potters No. 2 Creek which is followed back to the huts at Potters.

Old Man Rock (Obelisk) - Fraser Basin

A stop at Mitchell's Cottage (a Goldfields Park site) is a must. Just after the third gate is a fine old stone hut, about 15 metres below the road, surrounded by goldworkings. The outline of an old sledge track to the site from Fruitlands can be seen. The field was worked by the same family that built Mitchell's Cottage. The hut was also used as a base by the Otago Ski Club in the 1940s. The road steepens beyond here and good views open up. The summit of the Old Man Range between the Old Man and Hyde Rocks is a unique example in New Zealand of an arctic tundra landscape. The land is under snow for six or seven months each year and subject to high winds, frosts and cloud at all times. The constant wind has produced bare surfaces of bed-rock or residual cobbles and gravels in many places. Symmetrical soil hummocks, dimples and stripes, formed by the heaving and melting action of ground ice, are characteristic of large areas. The only vegetation to survive this harsh environment are sparse tundra-like cushion plants. Perhaps the most spectacular landscape feature are the numerous large tors ... "Huge unshapely masses of rock - weather beaten geological veterans - blackened and seamed and scarred by I know not how many centuries of conflict with the elements; some prostrate, some erect, others inclining earthwards; some fantastically grouped, others isolated and solitary; all scattered at irregular intervals, amidst immense tufts of tussock or 'snowgrass', like relics of a vast Druidical Temple" (Vincent Pyke).

The walk starts at the range crest, where the transmitter road heads north. Follow a 4WD track down into the head-waters of the Fraser River, where there is a small hut beside the stream. The hut contains four bunks suitable for overnight stays. The upper Fraser Basin is of great economic importance to the Alexandra district. Winter snowfall provides water storage for the summer operation of the Fraser hydro electric scheme and the Earnscleugh flats irrigation scheme. Snow depth measuring poles and a precipitation gauge are near the hut. The blue tussock lands of this basin are also used as summer grazing by Earnscleugh Station. From the hut follow up the river (now a small stream), through sphagnum moss fields to the head of the valley. The glacial cirque walls of the western slopes of the basin are impressive. The route (unmarked) climbs out on to the dividing ridge between the Fraser and Campbells Creek. A 4WD track is followed to Hyde Rock, back on the main range. From here another 4WD track is traversed; past numerous tors back to the transmitter road. The route is very exposed to the weather on this traverse.