12 September 2007

Huia Ridge Track

page 5

The track continues in uncompromising fashion, rough, boggy and slippery. What sort of superman am I beginning to emerge as?

A grumpy, grumbly and hungry sort is what.

I was going to say resentful, but resentment is one of those morning dew emotions that vanishes with the first touch of the sun, and here's the sun:

I feel a little like Caliban in the presence of this delicate beauty. (Miranda is, alas, unable to be here today.)

And down at the foot of the trunk, a couple of fern fronds are vividly set against a carpet of litter.

Yes, well... Where have I seen this track before?

It's at moments like these that a simple thing like noticing three small pigeonwood berries fallen green from a tree above, can re-orient you to the bigger picture. Now I can hear again as I write the heavy, thudding flap of kereru, which I had forgotten until now.

And a train of faint birdsong drifts back that had been accompanying me unaware for most of the trip. Yes, you do notice, but you have to point your awareness, focus it.

All of this philosophy does not improve the actual track conditions.

Anyhow, blessings to count. Here's a dry bit.

I could almost swear that someone has been along here in the past month or two with a weed cutter. That is real dedication and my hat's off to the ARC ranger concerned.

You can see over on the left where something has severed the leaves.

To the left a lancewood stands out against the sky, but of interest is the "juvenile" branchlet partway up the trunk with it's long, sawtooth leaves.

Enough is enough. I decide to call it quits and stop to eat my sandwiches and drink my coffee where the sun can reach me. I had rather wanted to get at least as far as the Nugget Track or Twin Peaks Track junctions, but that's for another day. I shall probably park at Mt Donald McLean carpark and walk in from there along Donald McLean track.

I shoulder my pack, re-settle the camera about my neck, grab my sticks and a swig of water to dilute the coffee, and head for home.

Not so fast. I am astounded when I reach the end of this unattractive track to see how many pictures there are of the return journey. Reminds me of that old Willie Nelson line, "Already I've reached mountain peaks and I've just begun to climb..."

Right there, to start with, is Tmesipteris, (silent t), the hanging fork fern, a plant form that goes back almost to the beginning of vegetation, so old that it is almost without contemporaries in the present.

These are Aspleniums, their shining foliage distinctive among our ferns.