28 February 2008

Atiwhakatu Track

(as far as Mountain House Junction)

page 4

This creeper is unfamiliar

I come in for a closer look

No idea. I wonder about clematis but a later hunt turns up nothing like these leaves. Below is a sadly out of focus Gaultheria, or snowberry, but it's the only one I saw in berry on the walk. I haven't seen it before in these circumstances, though as a shrub it was common around Waikaremoana.

Here's a kidney fern with a marvellous picotee edge to its fronds

and here's a real palette of mosses and lichens.

The path is opening up a little along here and we are on a gentle downhill grade. This is idyllic walking.

Down we go.

What was I saying about gentle, idyllic tracks.

and here's a fairly substantial bridge.

You can see the stabilising wires. There must be some powerful floods come down this valley.

That's upstream

and this shows just how far we have come down towards the river.

A few metres along the track and we have reached our destination, though not the end of the track. Up the hill is the route to Mountain House shelter.

Those are some quite steep steps. Alice is quite keen on investigating further but I suggest it's time to retrace our steps.

I pour a cup of coffee and wrap myself around a slab of fruitcake and enjoy the sitting. I snap a last pic of some attractive ferns, and we're on our way back. About four hours round trip all up, fatman time.