Upper Taieri

Two to three-day trips to the Upper Taieri, beginning at $1,360

Upper Taieri above Canadian Flat.

The Taieri River rises in the Lammerlaw and Lammermoor ranges cupping the isolated Maniototo Plain. The river flows north toward Ranfurly before turning abruptly south at Waipiata and Kokonga. The stretch of river from here to Middlemarch sees little pressure and fishes well until the dog days of summer.
    The peat-stained river has numerous tributaries that hold fish well in spring or high water. And the estuary at Taieri mouth holds both sea-run browns and a small run of salmon.
    But my favourite section of river is from Patearoa to the headwaters. This is the Maniototo, a strange lunar landscape of brown rocky ridges, leonine tussock and few trees. The basin, landlocked and rimmed by mountains, is technically a desert, with less than ten inches of rain a year. Strangely, the watershed here has many of the qualities of a swamp. From here to Waipiata the river oxbows repeatedly and teems with invertebrate life—midge, damsel, mayflies and corixae. Trout grow large and fat here and can be selective. Above the Styx confluence the river changes from marsh to high country. The pools become deeper, the runs more rapid, the ridges steeper.

Experience the austere beauty of the Maniototo and you’ll see why its vast landscape inspires writers like Janet Frame, Owen Marshall and Brian Turner and painters like Grahame Sydney. Trips can be based from either the Maniototo or Dunedin.