Karen writes: still playing mountain climbing

Tuesday was the high point of my fitness year.   Up early, big breakfast, then I got dropped off at Ocean beach for my favourite Christmas tramp/run.    Every year I attack the Lion range at the tip of the Whangarei Heads, starting with the steep trail up from the beach at Bream Head, where I pause near the top to say hello to my Grandfather Hill who worked on the 2^nd World War radar station there, then it is some serious up and down till I come out 3 hours later at Urquharts bay and run home (another hour). 

I love this route, but there is one part which always reminds me how easy it is to make mistakes, especially when you are by yourself.  An hour into the Lion tramp you get to the top of a steep bush slope and there is the choice of a left turn or a right turn.  The direction you instinctively go in is left, however following that way brings you onto a really skinny track with a drop on either side, then there is a big, but scale-able rock in the way.  The first year I did this I was sure I was going in the right direction, and climbed this rock, then there was another rock.  My anxiety levels were growing at this point, I couldn’t see the trail ahead, just more steep rock masses with these enormous drops to the sea.   My courage gave out (or I got sensible?) and I finally retraced my steps, coming back to the fork where I now took the trail to the right. This seemed to head back the way I had come, but then after a while it turned and became the main trail again.   I realised that the left fork had led only to a lookout, those rocks weren’t meant to be passed.   I have since visited the lookout every year, it has a spectacular view down the coast, but it always makes me think about how close I came to making a big mistake.   

Lookout view - the white dots are boats...

Went up Mt Manaia again this morning, the weather forecast was miserable, and it was drizzling when I left, but if I didn’t go I wouldn’t get any exercise.  I love working through the ‘layers’ of bush, at the bottom there are cabbage trees and it is quite overgrown, further up is a patch where there are ferns and moss and if you bump into a branch you get doused with water, and as you go up the foliage changes again, sometimes open, sometimes overgrown, sometimes dry and windblown.   Today the track was  universally wet and muddy, with the wind getting wilder the higher I got. I was casting a nervous eye above me thinking about how much risk there was of debris falling, then I got nearly to the top and the wind was suddenly just gone.  I was above the howling wind, in the clouds, what a strange place to be.    I didn’t linger at the top though, that fluffy grey white cloud is COLD, and I didn’t trust the wind, sure enough, as I came down the steps from the lookout a huge gust blasted across the rock and I was glad I wasn’t still standing up there daydreaming.

I realise that I feel fit!   It will be interesting next week to get on the bike and see how that feels after what will be 2 weeks off cycling.  Not long to go now...