Distance: 7.0 km (5.0 DOC hours) - Unmarked route, clear - Hard terrain
Altitude: 383m to 579m. Gain: 374m. Loss: 427m . Gradient: 7 deg (Moderate)
Skills: - Streams (2/6)

Unmarked route, clear (7/9)
Unmarked route, follows obvious geography (river, spur, trail, etc)

minor (5/5)
A viable route, not widely used

Moderate (difficulty: 3/5)
Occasional moderate climbs

Hard (difficulty: 5/5)
Thick scrub-bash / continuous river boulders, waterfalls, or gorges

None (difficulty: 1/7)
No alpine skills required

Streams (difficulty: 2/6)
Small streams, danger only in extreme weather

None (difficulty: 1/7)
No alpine skills required

Several hours of hard going, of untanging creepers from your pack, of unintentional slides down hillsides, and cursing of the untracked Southern Ruahines in general were required to reach the Rokaiwhana Stream from the Otamaraho. Basically, I stuck close to the park boundary, but far enough away to avoid the worst of the scrub and headed NE over the two spurs. The first was steep, tangled and OK in bush. The second was scrubby and terrible, and the paddock on the other side of the fence proved a strong temptation.

Once in the Rokawhana, I headed downstream to the forks (outside the park, but on Queen's Chain), and then took the eastern-most branch due north back into the park. Finally we're into good tall podocarp bush and good travel. After 2.5km the track shown on maps starts on the eastern bank (well cut and marked in 2007 - may be different now). The hut shown here is long-gone.

The track was then easy going to reach the Takapari West roadend / campsite 2km away.

Note: Described in the reverse direction to your journey

No description