Jacko Flat Hut
(Jacko Flat Hut looking up to Mt. Alexander: Photo Andrew Buglass 2007)
Maintenance Status
Jacko Flat Hut and the track to it from the Crooked
roadend will be fully maintained. The main valley tracks in the Crooked and the access track to
the Lake Morgan tops from the upper Crooked do exist despite not being marked on the current topo maps.
Location
Crooked River catchment. Map BU20. Grid Ref:
E1487860/ N5270715. Altitude
415m. Jacko Flat Hut is located on the TL of the Crooked River 15 minutes upstream from Jacko Flat.
The Hut is near the Northern boundary of Westland's
beech gap, and the
transition from podocarp/ rata/ hardwood to beech forest is evident here in a number of places.
Jacko Flat is dominated by the vista of the sheer rock
walls of the North face of Mt. Alexander. There are two gorges in the lower Crooked valley
below th Hut. Upstream the River does a sharp turn East and ascends from here at a gentle gradient its headwaters.
The Crooked has always been a fairly low-use valley with visitor numbers declining even further
due to overgrowing tracks in the 90's and 00's. The
tracks
were recut in 2009 by DOC and hopefully this will reverse the trend somewhat.
Access
Crooked valley access is up the old Rotomanu - Kopara Road which turns off
the new one just after Puzzle Creek. It is
rutted and scoured out in places, but OK for 2-wheel drive if care is taken. The upper gate has a
sign on it saying the landowner accepts no responsibility for any problems to your vehicle
if you park further up. In the past this gate has been padlocked, but is not currently.
The lower gate (Bell Hill Road) is padlocked at night and you need to get the key from the house down the road.
The Crooked valley track starts behind
the Kopara Reserve Sign just above the piles of the old Crooked bridge.
It climb/ sidles up and around the first gorge for an hour or so, then drops back to river level.
The trail follows the river terraces from here to just past the Morgan River confluence.
There is a 300m section of riverbed just below the start of 2nd gorge.
DOC have disked this in a couple places on the TR, requiring two river crossings.
This will be OK at normal River flows, but will require travel on the TL otherwise. The
track re-enters the bush at the start of the gorge and climb/ sidles around it. The faces are steep on this section
and the trail is rough, uneven and rocky underfoot.
After around an hour of sidling
Jacko Flat comes into view and the track
drops gradually to the River. Jacko Flat Flat is overgrowing and some cutting is needed. This could be poled or waratahed to
help people find their across.
Hut is 400m up from Jack's
Creek, which is large, unamed creek on the Topo Map at the top end of the Flat. There are a few fresh
windfalls on the track between Jacks Creek and the Hut.
The Hut is in a small clearing surrounded by small hardwoods, 20m from the River. Allow 4.5 - 5.5 hours to get to it
from the roadend.
The track up
to Top Crooked Hut
was recut by DOC in 2009. It passes through fairly open beech forest on the TL with a
couple of riverbed sections midway up. On the lower section DOC have disked a route up one of the river channels.
This will be OK at normal flows, but in flood would require a slow bash on the TL.
Care is required on the upper short section also. The track emerges at the bottom end of the top river flat,
just downstream of the Hut. Top Crooked is up on a low river terrace and is visible from the riverbed.
Allow around 2 - 2.5 hours to Top Crooked from Jacko Flat Hut.
An open grassy patch next to Jacko Flat Hut would probably allow helicopter access.
Type
Jacko Flat is a standard six-bunk NZFS design with an open fireplace built in the 1960's.
It has a toilet. Water is
from the River.
Condition
Jacko Flat is in still in reasonably good condition and was repainted and resealed
by DOC in the summer of 2003/ 4. the Iron interior of the fireplace has rusted through at the bottom and needs
replacing, although the fireplace is still safe to use. The floor is starting to sag a bit also. The Hut will need
some remedial maintenance in the medium-term.
Routes
A track marked on the older maps up Jack's Creek to the Alexander Range
no longer exists in any useful form.
The occasional bit of permolat can be found and
the creek is
apparently followable in its lower and mid sections, although there are
a couple of waterfalls to negotiate. The upper Creek sounds like a pretty serious and unpleasant scrub-bash.
There is a recent entry in the hutbook of a trip down the Creek from the Mt. Alexander Tarns that took 7 hours,
with plenty of stops.
The spur
directly opposite Jacko Flat Hut has been used on occasions to access the tops and
Lake Morgan Hut. It looks OK on the map, but accounts
of the route in the Lake Morgan hutbook are not encouraging. There is an extensive alpine
scrub band and bluffs from 700-1100m. It is
probably quicker to take the less direct route up the main
valley and take the tops track opposite Top Crooked Hut.
Repairs Needed
Repairs or replacement of the bottom plate
of the chimney will be required at some point in the medium term.
Provisions On Site
There are 3 billies, a pot,
a large camp oven, an aluminium
wash basin, a large plastic water container, an old FS food drum with a bit of food in it,
a fish slice, an axe, two brooms, one spare broom handle, heaps of permolat, and 7 old perspex
louvre panes. There are odds and sodds of timber under the Hut.
