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Nineteen people showed up to walk a new section of the Te Araroa Trail from Mangatawhiri to Whangamarino
south of Mercer. We left The Bracken soon after 8am and met at a point on the old SH2 8km from the SH1
turnoff, ready to set out about 9am on the first part of our walk, the Mangatawhiri River Track. This
was a level route following the southeastern stopbank of the river along a largely straight course for
about 5km.
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We had our elevenses stop at 10:45am where the track took a right-angle course away from the river.
We finished the track at 11:10am at a pump-station with an Archimedes Screw which is part of the drainage.
After a short comfort stop we road bashed the McIntyre Rd, a quiet and pleasant 20 minute road bash to
Koheroa Rd passing several wetlands run by the Auckland/Waikato Chapter of Fish and Game.
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Our original intention was to do the Koheroa Bypass, a road bash up Kellyville Rd and down into Koheroa
Rd. However we saw signs indicating another new section of track going through swampy land to go under
SH1 and follow that highway’s right-hand side to Mercer. The track was mainly just a route marked by
orange markers, with short stretches of formed track.
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We sat down for lunch in a spot out of the wind just before the township of Mercer. John read out
two poems he wrote based on true stories. The first one was about Catalin Fercu, a Roumanian rugby player
whose ambition was to play in the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand. He trained hard to achieve this,
and had packed his bags, and arrived at the airport ready for the 40 hour trip to NZ. He was at the counter
with his passport and ticket ready to check in when he suddenly turned away and pulled out of the team
- all because he was afraid of flying! The second one was about a lady called Thelma who was so fearful
of planes - she was determined never to travel in a plane because she was scared it will crash and she
would be killed. One day she and her husband Alec had booked to go to Wanganui by train to see her old
friends. The train was cancelled because the line was blocked by slips after a storm, so Alec suggested
they fly there. Thelma said NO, but Alec went to buy the tickets. Putting her trust in God over her fear,
she boarded the plane. She didn’t like the flight, but was pleased to catch up with her friends. They
had taken a girl Kitty into the family, who soon gave birth to a daughter Delwynne. The four of them
spent a lot of quality time together, at home and on trips to Rotorua, Tauranga, Hawaii and Disneyland
just to name a few. Thelma also went to Australia for a family reunion. Much later Thelma became unwell,
having suffered a stroke. Kitty and her husband Bill were going to Sydney to visit Thelma’s brother Wilf,
but Thelma felt very rejected because they didn’t invite her to come along. The real reason was she was
too sick to travel, and therefore could not get insurance. She really wanted to go there with them, and
of course there was only one way to get there. The message of the devotions was to be like Thelma and
overcome your fear with God’s help; not to let fear dominate and ruin as Catalin did.
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The shopping centre of Mercer made for a comfort stop before we crossed the bridge over the highway,
and began the final part of our tramp, the Whangamarino Redoubt Track at 1:40pm. This began off the end
of Skeet Rd, and climbed steeply up a fenceline to continue as a rough and hilly route marked by orange
markers. In several places the markers were missing, and we had to scout around to find the track.
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We came out to the historic Whangamarino Redoubt reserve at 3pm, joining up with the old Whangamarino
Walkway that had been established in the early 1980s. Ten minutes later we were out at Oram Rd, where
Geoff was waiting to take the drivers back to the start of the tramp to collect their cars.
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