Platinum Mines and Sledge Track

Today was perfect tramping weather - a bit overcast and nice and breezy!

We have wanted to head back out to Sledge Track for some time now as our last attempt at making it to the Platinum Mines were thwarted by very deep mud and a very rainy day. (I remember tramping around in the thick mud for a long time and finally Travis said, "uh, I don't really think it's going to be worth it to go all the way!"....So, we saved it for a better day.)

The better day came today...For those around the Palmerston North region, Sledge Track is a wonderful area to go for a short tramp, swim, picnic by the river, or nice long/challenging climb to the top! It just has something for everyone. This track is really well maintained and marked and you can see where they have done a tone of work since we were last up there. It's only about 20 min. from our front door so we feel really blessed.

We have been up to this area about four/five times now and Travis even took the rural fire crew up in this area for some rural fire training. It is just a really beautiful area to get away to if you just want to get out of the city for a few hours.

Travis by the Kahuterawa Stream.

This area is lovely to sit and relax with a book and enjoy the peacefulness. Of course, if your tramping partner is like Travis he doesn't know how to sit quietly by a stream and read a book - So, onwards and upwards it is...
I was sad to be leaving this beautiful scene for an uphill climb, but it was actually a lovely tramp and we had some nice views from up top as well.
Once you leave the picnic/swimming area you enter what they call the 'elevation'...and yes, it is true, it is pretty much a straight up hill track from there on. The track is really well maintained and in a lot of places there are staircases built which makes the uphill climb pretty mild. Once you hit treeline it evens out quite a bit and is very enjoyable.

Actually, after some of the tramps we have done we found this one to be on the "easy" side of things and we made it up to the top in nearly half the time estimated. Unfortunately after talking about going back here and seeing the mines for almost a year now, we were very sad to find that the mine was only a dark hole filled with water! I had envisioned us roaming around a dark mine with our headlamps exploring the mining shafts of days gone by...Not to be so, for all of our efforts lead us only to a dark hole which we could not enter - It was not even worth taking a picture of - Oh so sad...No matter, it was still a really lovely track and we had a wonderful time.

Altogether the tramp only took us 3hr 20 min (the estimated time being between 5-6 hours) ~ Mind you that this is "Travis tramping time" meaning that no other person in their right mind would be tramping that fast! haha.

So, that was our wonderful tramp this weekend. If you feel the need to get away from it all sometime, hop on down the road just a little way and check out this lovely area. Thank you to the Palmerston North City Council and to the volunteers that make this track both accessible and well maintained!