Makara Peak

It has actually been months since J and I hiked to the top of Makara Peak and took these pictures. I feel that I should inform all of you lovely readers that I am hopelessly behind in my posts, and will have to lead a boring and uneventful life for several months in order to catch up. Fortunately, I am finding the everyday happenings of life quite adequately challenging, tiring, and even sometimes overwhelming lately, so I think quite and calm (where I can find them) are in order. I will do my best to capitalize and catch myself up.

Makara Peak, as you may remember from my December post, is in the mountain bike park by the same name that is right next to our house.

412m is 1,352ft, which is not very high for a "peak," although one must remember that it is 9 kilometres from the ocean, so it is a considerable difference from sea level. And yes, please feel free to empathize with the fact that I bike up and down a considerable percentage of this incline every day.

(Aotearoa is the Māori name for New Zealand, in case you were wondering).

The path, however, is not always easy. We found it interesting and engaging as hikers, but were constantly staggered to think that it is actually designed for mountain bikes! I was profoundly reinforced in my belief that I will not ever be riding on the "Expert" trails, given that "Expert" is clearly code for "Fine with falling off a cliff onto jagged rock or shattering your bike on an unexpected boulder."

I love green landscapes!

We haven't explored the paths in this direction yet, but I'm sure we will some time. All the green area is still part of the massive park, and you can also see some of Wellington and the harbour.

And in case that wasn't enough, here is a beautiful view of the stunning Wellington Harbour.

And in case that wasn't enough, here the the broader expanse of Wellington, sprawling out around the harbour and in among the hills.

J was quite pleased to get to the top. It was a pretty hot day, but although the top meant we were out in the sun, it also meant that we got the full force of the chilly breeze, which was fabulous.

I was very excited to see this wind farm, as I quite like them. J informed me that it is the biggest one in NZ (and acted as if he had known this his entire life and didn't understand how I hadn't).

Also, I love seeing the land across the water. We were told that you can see the South Island (which is actually west of Wellington) from Makara Peak, but neither of us could actually determine the proper direction to look accurately enough to tell where it was. We think that it was not this view, which is way too close, but a similar one of hills farther off and in a different direction. The camera did not agree that they were visible, so there's no picture. Anyway, it was cool.

I have decided that I like this city.

J likes it, too. We think we'll stay.

I love the layers that you can see from up there!

I think it is very cool that we live right by this beautiful area, and I look forward to having visitors who can climb to the top and look out over the majesty of this landscape.