Another hike around the Cascades

I realised something after I entitled this post, "Another hike around the Cascades."  I haven't actually done a first post about hiking around the Cascades. So, to rectify that lack, here is today's offering. I can still legitimately call it 'another' hike because this is a walk we have taken many times in the past. 

Cascade Kauri Regional Park is about a 20 minute drive from our house in the direction of Bethell Beach (Te Henga).  It's in the Waitakere Range. The walk we always take is about a kilometre and a half. On today's walk though, we added to it a bit, venturing off the usual circle, and climbed a very steep side trail. Our regular trail is a user friendly one. This new trail demonstrated another attitude I thought.  It was as much up, as forward, and I hung back a bit while the younger members of our trek team disappeared rapidly into it's foliage. 

Here are some pictures from our tramp.

Mom and the boys head off across the swinging bridge. That 20 refers to the number of people on the bridge at one time, not to a speed limit. For a short span, that bridge is very springy.

We're just barely 'out of the gate' and the trail is already climbing.

Soon, the trail tossed out any pretence of kindness to us older persons, and got down to business, I should say, up, to business. (as in, up to no good)

See what I mean about that trail? There were a whole bunch of these things. It put them end to end for a while. 

The younger ones disappeared quickly ahead, and above me. There goes Jeanne following at a more leisurely  pace. As a good camera man, I felt it was my duty to lag behind and shoot action shots of the others. My upward momentum at this point was the very definition of sedate. I might have even appeared sedated. 

While I was resting, ah, I mean, checking my camera, Amiri had already made it to the top of the trail and come back down again. He didn't report any of the light-headedness, ear popping, or altitude sickness that I had experienced during my climb. I think the rest of the family, in their mad dash up that almost vertical trail, had sucked up all the available oxygen and I, as the last in line, was breathing depleted air.  What other explanation could there be? 

And here comes the rest of the crew on Amiri's heels. (See what I mean about steep?)  I stayed ahead of them on the downward leg of the journey to insure I didn't get shortchanged on the oxygen again. I recovered quickly.

A fern tree in front of a cliff.  The rest of the crew had been up on top of it earlier. (the cliff)

Notice that as the top is unfurling, so are the individual leaves along the length of the frond.

A closer look at the leaves as they unroll

We always stop at this point in the trail. Obvious reason. 

Also, it has some comfortable roots for sitting just above ground level. I appreciated that. 

I loved looking up at this swirl... I almost felt as though I was oxygen deprived again as it rippled in the breeze...

Here's another one and from another angle as well.

We're back at the parking lot again but won't leave before we get a prize-winning grandson shot.

What doesn't show in this picture is that there is a Very stiff breeze blowing into the boys faces. It is amazing that Amiri managed to stand and not get blown off that 4 inch thick frame. In fact, he was working on standing on one foot and really challenging it. Arram got up part way and said he was lighter than Amiri and the wind would surely send him through the frame if he tried to get to his feet. He was probably right.  -djf