Summer Walks: Mt Cass, Stour River, Kaituna Valley, Kaitorete Spit and Birdlings Flat

Mount Cass, 12 January 2014

A good walk on a very windy day. A circular walk up to the top of the hill from which there are good views of  the Canterbury plains and all along Pegasus Bay back to the Banks Peninsular




We found lots of mushrooms and carried them all the way back down to the car. They appeared to bruise and began to smell a bit so I checked them on Google and found they were 'yellow stainers' not field mushrooms at all. Not deadly poisonous but likely to cause tummy upsets, a lucky escape . . .

Stour River, 19 January 2014

A beautiful path through long grasses beside the sparkling, gurgling River Stour. Butterflies everywhere but very, very hot today

The path went on up the valley and as the day grew hotter we became desperate for shade, ending up hiding from the sun under a prickly 'wild Irishman' bush

We had to cross many streams on stepping stones but then we came to the river itself and there was nothing for it but to take off boots and socks and walk across it. My first river crossing and a good way to cool down.

Mike found a better way to cool down, just stripped off and jumped in. Way too cold for me so I just paddled.

Kaituna Valley, 26 January 2014

This valley is on the Banks Peninsular and is on private land instead of DOC land. The upper valley slopes were like tree graveyards. I guess settlers just cleared the land for sheep farming but found it too difficult to remove them

This was taken from the crater rim path which we joined at the highest point. You can see the Kaitorete Spit and Lake Ellesmere on the horizon, and in the middle distance on the RH side is the forest remnant we entered on our way down

A small patch of enchanted forest remains surrounded by dead trees

Kaitorete Spit and Birdlings Flat, 2 February 2014


Looking out to sea on Kaitorete Spit. A ever-changing finger of pebbles and drift wood twixt sea and lake

Looking back towards the Banks Peninsular

 

Posing on a lava bomb with my bag of drift wood

Birdlings Flat is a small community at the neck of land which joins the Spit to the Peninsular. An interesting mix of homemade baches, driftwood artwork, and other oddities. There's a good little museum of gem stones and other paraphernalia picked up on the Spit