Was chatting to a pighunter earlier in the week, who after the second beer 'suddenly' remembered a shack he'd seen in the bush.
As I had today off, I decided on sooner rather than later.
Turned up at the end of the track a couple of hours before dawn, threw the pack and headlamp on and headed off into the dark. It was relatively simple, follow the track for 'about 45minutes, then when you hear the waterfall break left and go bush'. I had a good idea from his other descriptions and a few beers-worth of research over my old maps and GoogleEarth where this thing might be. Soon enough I could hear the sound of water off in the distance. Quick glance at the map and I figured there was a better route, it added 15 minutes to the track distance, but cut the bushcrashing by 10. A crash in the bush is worth two on the track, or something like that.
Reached the best spot to leave civilisation, took a bearing and disappeared down the bank into a Parataniwha infested gully. Found the stream handrail and headed downstream for 50m then where the stream did a kickback I took the next bearing and up out of the gully - into a clearing well frequented by pigs.
Dug out the BIG torch and shone it around, nothing obvious but it should be here. Nothing but Puriri, Manuka...and an ancient Peach tree. The bush has overtaken the shack, but I could now see where the path to the stream once was, and followed it up to a pile of rotting roughsawn Kauri weatherboards.
First light was just starting, so I dropped the pack and had a look around by torchlight to get the 'feel' of the place, orientation of the building, access, extents of the inhabited area etc.
The building, or what was left of it, was old, with candle soot dates going back to the 1960's. So, it was likely well abandoned by then.
By now there was enough daylight to give that dull grey morning-bush light that still needs electric assistance, so assembled the detector, tuned it up and started working the area which would have been the front lawn, as it were.
Within the first minute, I already had my first tear tab! Right, I'll tune those buggers out, right now.
Next swing and that lovely high tone - 1935 shilling. This could be fun. Spent an hour just working the front of the shack, finding the rubbish pile (diet of just mutton by the looks of it), nothing metallic of interest in there though.
Checking the paths, humungous 2' Totara corner strainers for caches, and under the floor as best I could gave another shilling, and 2 each of 6d and 3d - all in the 30's.
Also seeing the light of day was a stirrup, bottle of Baxters Lung Preserver (can only imagine what that would've tasted like!) and a soundbox plate for a gramophone - I know this, as it's the same as one of my never-to-be-finished projects that I subsequently dug out of the garage to check. (1925ish, £7 RRP)
Wanted to get back to the car before any 'rats' found it as it wasn't the most secure location on earth, hence the dawn op to get in and out before they sobered up.
Stripped the machine down again and stuffed it in the pack, couple of jelly snakes for fuel, took a back bearing and proceeded to make like a little bushpig back to the track.
Quick TXT to my wife to a) wake her up, and b) let her know I was on the way back, then struck out back to the car.
Made better time in the daylight and was back at the car 15m ahead of schedule. Hadn't noticed all the broken window glass from previous unfortunate cars that had parked here. Still, mine was intact so a quick change out of the muddy gear and home to bacon and eggs for breakfast.
Definitely worth another visit, but will probably wait until the nights get a bit colder to keep the rats indoors. It's a long walk to the nearest cell coverage!
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