If we want to have a look at this from the Stonefields, we find a variety of obstacles and detours in our way, some of them electrified as Alice will remind you. The best approach is from the end of the sealed section of Ihumatao Rd where you will find the South Gate of the reserve.
Just park your car somewhere near the welcome sign. I couldn't see any heaps of broken glass around - there's a house just across the road - but there are enough empty bottles and cans around to suggest it's a quiet spot for a few beers on occasion.
From here its a right angle walk, about ten minutes or so, to the volcanic cone.
Over to the right the Otuataua sky is getting ready to its stuff. Is that a touch of grey near the horizon.
What was it Jerry Garcia sang? "Every silver lining's got a touch of grey."
Well, we will get by, I reckon.... Alice has a raincoat on at any rate, and it won't be the first time we've been soaked out here.
So much for a touch of grey, we can see to the side a touch of economising.
Whatever happened to the bottom 2 or 3 wires? (There's a number of eight-wire fences around elsewhere.)
Even Aice with her general sensitivity about wire fences pops her head under and checks out the wall. (I'm told there are a good many rabbits around in the stonefields.)
To the left is the low cone of Otuataua, with an opening on this side.
At the back you can see the row of pines that shelter the avocado orchard below as you go in the main gate.
Immediately to the left is what looks like another geological curiosity but at present I lack the knowledge to comment further. Right in the centre of the paddock is a roughly circular muddy depression.
We turn the corner up ahead, and it's another 100 metres or so to a set of gates.
To the left is a race that we can now see takes you up to the Stonefields tracks. The field to the left with the tree in it contains the remains of quite extensive Maori gardens. We'll have a look at those from higher up.
Extreme right is a pedestrian gate that refuses to move more than an inch or two, so we go through the big gate.
Across the lower lip of the crater, a row of decent size rocks discourages access to what is probably a dream motordrome — with a few rocks cleared away, mind you. Make a fine natural ampitheatre, too, with stage already in place.
Hello! What's this, out in the middle of nowhere? A farm on town water supply?
I'd say so, though there's not a lot of water, to be sure.
I head around the side towards the highest part of the crater. The section to the left is fairly securely fenced off, but it looks as though there've been people or cattle this way before. Someone is at least dealing to the gorse. Please pay attention to the smilax and the kapok vine.
Below us to the south is another fairly large depression that seems likely to be of volcanic origin. Centre hard left is the depression we photographed earlier on our way in.
As we look around towards the west we see the remains of old Maori gardens, just visible as lines in the paddocks - a bit like the old Roman roads in Britain. Bottom right of the picture are heaps of rock that would likely have served to conserve local microclimate warmth.
I can't see any visual evidence of a former pa - certainly nothing like the slopes of Mt Eden or One Tree Hill - but the subtler evidence I'm not tuned into so far. It's also unclear exactly where the former quarry was sited around here. The cone remains relatively intact.
We follow the crater rim along the fenceline and look out to see an elderly Maori in the stonefields proper gathering mushrooms into a plastic bucket. There's been a fair few mushrooms to be seen the last week or two.
Time to go. We make our way down from the rim and around to where we came in.
At the moment I am slowly working my way back from a weight blowout to 147 kg associated with a course of betablockers plus side effects. The new pills appear to be without such side effects, but, while coming down from that, I am still at a point where I feel like I have a heavily laden pack on my back all the time, even when I'm getting out of an armchair or walking down or up the front steps. Each step needs at least a little thought, and the floor has receded somewhat into the distance. The stonefields are a valuable resource for gentle walking and continued (relative) fitness.
I have booked on a Manukau City Council ranger-led tour of the fields in July 2010, which requests a good level of fitness. I hope that doesn't translate into speed, as I'm certainly able to complete all the walks. Fatman time is an excellent rate of travel for seeing what's around you. I'll post some of the results here when I've done that. Fatman time for this trip is a little over thirty minutes.
