Fresh!

Annette Atkins

(the highly sought-after,imported,underground bootleg version)

A tramping club meeting? Oh,is this where we sign up for the Fresher's Trip? It's this weekend;that's what...three days away! Of course I'm going,Everyone goes on the Fresher's Trip! "Everyone" was no exaggeration - 73 of us set off on Saturday for (where did we start?),the start of our tramp. From (whereever) the track more or less followed the Waiohine River,often dropping down to the water.

Our group led the way from the start. Naturally we felt pretty smug about our leading pace,until the rest of the party caught up and told us we'd missed out on some good swimming. Well,you can't have everything.

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Totara Flats was an ideal campsite - a big paddock by the river (plenty of grazing for the sheep that came along). A few nasty holes in the ground. Mike Sheridan walked into one twice,unfortunately. Soon our campsites were established and a few cans plus bottles of wine helped dinner go down. Only a campfire was missing - but a symbolic candle sufficed nicely. I mean,soma of those jokes were really disgusting!!

Poor (lucky?) Rosie was the only one to crawl into the tent to sleep, eventually. The rest of our group fell asleep around the candle,when we'd DEFINITELY heard that one before. A fine arrangement,but I don't think Brian was too excited at waking up to find my feet in his face.

Our return trip on Sunday lead us further up along the river,until we reached the bottom of a hill. Then we had to go to the top of the hill!Probably the only part of the tripI didn't enjoy. It sure was a relief to walk/run/crawl/fly downhill to (whereever),where we swam and sunned ourselves before the bus ride home.

Our stomachs groaned and so did we as the bus roared past entire streets of takeaways,the driver completely oblivious to our SUBTLE hints. Everyone forgot to bring their milkshakes and chips on the tramp.

I'll have to admit the trip was a success - we even had a 100% survival rate. Though,will everyone survive club membership??