" Mount Faraday (4925 feet) Paparoa National Park 5th November 1998 My First Ascent Martin Thoma’s first parapente descent. I'd been keen to get into the craggy Paparoas for years. After several exploratory trips in the Four Mile road, which allowed me to get the car a good deal nearer the peaks. I still did not know which road went where. Young Pierre Champness of Punakaiki told me he had climbed Faraday with his Dad (Graham) several years previously and he would show me the way. He said it would be a long day trip. When the weather looked settled for Guy Fawkes weekend. I got Pierre to agree to be guide. Martin Thoma decided to join us and I picked him up at Cobden Bridge on a promising morning at 5.a.m. Martin lived in Kaiata and cycled to the bridge. We squeezed his bike into the back seat of my ageing yellow Datsun 160B and drove on to pick up Pierre at Punakaiki at 5.40. We drove as near to Faraday as I thought our family car could take--- 10 km into the four-mile road and right up on to the terrace just before the Nile crossing. Five km along this we walked for 20 mins to a gap in the roadside cutting which allowed us to drop down the steep bank to the Nile. One ..." — stu • Nov 5, 1989