29 September 2007

In the Steps of Jack Leigh

Chapter 18: Takapuna to Milford

page 4

We're now past the promenade and onto the beach proper. Jack comments that local protesters forced the course of the sewage pipe inland behind the beachfront sections on Milford Beach, thus doing themselves out of an excellent breakwater, and leaving their coastal boundaries highly vulnerable. The next section is almost a standing exhibition of wall building.

We pass Saltburn Rd and we just glimpse an exterior shower for removing beach sand before coming inside the house.

Pohutukawas feature strongly along here, mostly middle-aged and probably deliberately planted, if we compare them to the grandeur of the Thorne Bay specimen. (The pics are often taken looking backwards so as to have the sun behind)

The walls are solid, but even so, in many cases the steps down to the beach tell their own story

Hello. that's never a graffiti is it?

Some walls immaculately reflect the houses behind

There's something vaguely acropolistic about the prospect,
come to think of it.

I wonder how deep the wooden poles go.

At regular intervals are drainage outfalls, with small signs urging kiddies not to play anywhere nearby.

Which seems to be rather a shame really ...

We pass Cecil Rd.

There's been some add-ons here.

I find myself humming something out of the old Ira Sankey Hymnbook about "the wise man built his house upon a rock". Showing my age.

I've heard people who should know suggest that Peter's name probably translated more accurately as "Rocky", and given his tendency to remove ears from servants of the high priest with a sword he was not legally entitled to be carrying, one has to wonder.

It's all just a bit fragile, even given the size of the boulders.