Urchin Again

Catherine and Margaret On Their Way Up

This summer, Catherine, her sister Margaret and I had Xmas at Pukawa and the day before Xmas had a day walk up Mt Urchin in misty weather.  It was a good day for walking - not much of a view from the top but great atmospheric misty scenes in the bush.  At one stage a morepork (the NZ owl, Ruru) was disturbed by our passage and flew out of the bush from its daytime roost in a tree.  It passed close to my head and its noiseless flight was quite erie.

Foggy On Top Of Urchin

On top we found a sheltered spot for our early lunch and cuppa and descended through the foggy bush to the faithful Boris, my Nissan of many a mountain trip. Urchin is always a nice outing.






Urchin is a different peak to those in the volcanic landscape to the west. It has a summit of greywacke rock which is part of the main Indian-Australian plate uplifted by the downward plunging Pacific plate.  The last 15 minutes, after you burst from the bush are up through alpine vegetation and on this occasion there were several Celmisias in flower. The long-tailed cuckoos were in residence again after their migration and were shrieking about the upper edge of the bush - not many of their offsprings foster parents were in evidence - better to keep their heads down in such times!

The Downward Track

The Downward Track