West Coast walk

I'm trying out my new camera. Last month we went over to the other side of Auckland, the west side, and out of the city. As you come out of the sprawling suburbs which go on for ever, you start climbing gently up to a village called Titirangi. This is the start of the Waitakere ranges, a modest range of mountains forested with native NZ bush, a great place for bush walking. You can get very lost here.

As you descend on the other side of the hills you come down steeply to the coast, the wilder side of the Auckland isthmus which has black volcanic sand and was made famous in the film 'The Piano' years ago, but like many parts of New Zealand, has now been used as locations for many films.

On this trip we went to Muriwai beach and the coast between Muriwai and Bethells beach (Te Henga). The Waitakeres are where Sir Ed trained for his jaunt up Mount Everest, and a new 4 day walk has been marked for keen walkers called the Hilary Trail. Our walk on this day was along a section of it.





Back at Muriwai Beach to see quite a few surfers around sunset. The waves on this side of Auckland are bigger; there aren't any sheltering islands out on this side to break up the waves.