Walk: Zion Track Loop, Karekare (Waitakere Ranges).

Описание: Sunset gold.

This is my first voice over on a YouTube video because I had so many photos for this one and realised - that's too much silence haha Hopefully, I will improve and stick to the content within the video.

My cousin B and I, set off to do the Zion Track Loop in Karekare. We set off in the late afternoon and returned around 9pm in the dark without torches haha

The Zion Track begins on the left side as you walk through the Pohutukawa Glade, which can be found on your right when you come out of the main Karekare carpark. It's lit up red in summer with the pohutukawa flowers. The Zion track is a steady climb diagonally up the mount with scenic views over Karekare beach, the Watchman and some of Mercer bay cliffs and of Panatahi Island below as climb up the mount.

The tracks were muddy and clay ridden with tree roots but I think the council has since upgraded it with steps, boardwalks and lookouts in places.

Once you come down the Buck Taylor track - the real fun begins and I wonder if they upgraded that narrow clay track that goes downwards. I have big thighs so they don't go one in front of the other so easily haha

One of my favourite parts of this track was towards the bottom of the track as you head towards Pararaha Valley and you can see through scrub and flax, its valley. It's very special and reminds me of something you would see in a dinosaur movie - I imagine pterodactyls in the sky and other prehistoric reptiles running around in the swamp. It's just something best experienced near sunset.

Sunsets out west are always special but to see the ridgeline from Whatipu up to Karekare lit up like gold is something majestic and spectacular. You have to see it with your own eyes. The camera on my phone at the time was stink so it didn't translate properly but I try not to edit my footage.

B and I eventually made our way back to the car park in the dark but because we have been out here so many times and I am very much in tune with Karekare; it was easy to see the dark outlines of the ridges against a sky of stars that helped us to navigate our way back without torches.

I absolutely loved this walk.

Dinosaur valley.


March, 2016.