One snowy October day I saw Witch Hill speckled with snow. While blistering nor'westers blew, I saw Witch Hill change from spring green to summer khaki. Canterbury's nor'wester reminded me of the Witch Wind scorching across Namaqualand sandveld, dessicating Kleinzee where we'd lived during 1984-86. I didn't know if NZ had real witches, but on Halloween nights kids dressed in witch and ghost costumes knocked on our door, begging for "Trick or Treat."
I drove along Cashmere Road and Centaurus Road to the end of Hillsborough Terrace, and parked my car at Mount Vernon Reserve carpark below Port Hills. Mount Vernon Reserve had two valleys separated by a ridge, stretching from the Port Hills. As I wanted to climb to the top of 421m Witch Hill, I walked Valley Track to the left of the ridge.
Despite midday sun and blue sky, the southerly in my face was cold and cut through my jersey. The southerly rippled grass and tussocks on the ridge. The plantings at the start of Valley Track were mainly pittosporums, manukas, dodoneas, lace barks and cabbage trees. Cabbage tree blossom scent wafted on the wind. I passed a left turnoff sign to Rogers Track, and followed Victoria Stream past caves on either side of the "stream" - slimy, stagnant pools.
After passing through three gates, I came across a shelter with two wooden benches on two wooden decks. "Wildlife" paintings on the shelter's corrugated iron roof were kitsch. From the shelter, I snapped Christchurch down Valley Track.
2008 Valley Track, Mount Vernon Reserve, looking towards Christchurch
Beyond the shelter, Valley Track narrowed and veered leftwards, upwards to Witch Hill, so I lost sight of Christchurch. Despite knobbly rocks and hazardous underrunner holes in underfoot clay, I had Valley Track to myself, except for an ewe and her three lambs. After a fourth rickety gate and fence, plantings stopped, and the valley became tussock grassland, sprinkled with sedges, bracken, foxgloves and Californian thistles.
Above left, I saw walkers and joggers on Rapaki Track, which paralleled Valley Track. When I joined Rapaki Track, two girls sitting beside Valley Track asked, "How are ya?"
"Cold wind," I said. "I'm getting wind-burnt."
2008 Valley Track looking up to Rapaki Track & Witch Hill (The Dog's Head - Maori)
2008 Jogger on Rapaki Track overlooking Christchurch, Avon-Heathcote Estuary & Pacific Ocean
Rapaki Track got steeper as it neared Summit Road. I could see why Maori called Witch Hill "The Dog's Head," as it had a head, ears, brow and long snout when seen from Rapaki Track. While I drank CocaCola at a bench a jogger passed me, but I caught up with him when he sat panting near Summit Road. I snapped Avoca Valley, when I saw the nursery where I'd worked far below, and beyond was Lyttelton port's container depot. Near Summit Road I snapped a DOGS ON LEAD sign, and watched three smartly dressed walkers go down Rapaki Track with ski-pole walking-sticks.
2008 Top of Rapaki Track, Montgomery Spur, Port Hills, Christchurch
2008 Cliff at base of Witch Hill, Port Hills, Christchurch
I crossed Summit Road, briefly joined Crater Rim Walkway and found a track up Witch Hill. Dodging smelly sheep dung and cow pats, and seeing blue and white NZ harebells, Wahlenbergia gracilis, like on The Tors, I boulder-hopped to the top of Witch Hill. The climb from the carpark to the top of Witch Hill took me 1.5 hours.
Digression: SA had real witches - Sangomas and Inyanga herbalists. South Africans were great witch-hunters: blacks blamed white settlers for 300 years of apartheid since Jan van Riebeeck's time, never admitting that blacks' thieving and murderous ways may have necessitated apartheid; blacks blamed witches (usually old women) for casting spells on them, then seeking murderous retribution; Boers blamed Brits for their suffering in two Boer Wars; Afrikaners blamed Engelse during my life for the Boer War; Afrikaners blamed swart gevaar and / or kommunis rooigevaar for strife in apartheid SA during my life; English souties blamed Afrikaners for SADF conscription, and compulsory kultuur and Afrikaans in state schools; 1976 blacks in Soweto blamed Afrikaans tuition for blacks destroying black township schools; white racists blamed white liberals for the 1992 "Yes for reform" white referendum; verkrampte Afrikaners blamed verligte Afrikaners and / or English / Jewish liberals for giving SA to ANC in 1994; racist whites blamed black crime for their post apartheid emigration, never admitting that apartheid may have necessitated black crime for black survival; white racists blamed post apartheid black affirmative-action for their woes, never admitting to white affirmative-action / job reservation during apartheid; whites blamed blacks for torturing and murdering white farmers post apartheid, never admitting they'd done the same to blacks during apartheid; 14 years after apartheid ended, blacks blamed apartheid for their woes...
SA media regularly reported black-on-black witch killings in places like Vendaland and Zululand, and black-on-black muti-murders for sangomas, like the Kei Ripper around Butterworth and Idutwa hacking out body parts for muti, like dried and ground genitals, fetching high prices in sangomas' muti shops. I'd often driven through Butterworth and Idutwa in the Transkei on our East London to Durban treks.
2008 WW1 Memorial, Top of Witch Hill, Port Hills, Christchurch
2008 From Top of Witch Hill: Summit Road, The Tors, Castle Rock in Port Hills, Christchurch
On top of Witch Hill I had 360 degree views over murky, cloudy Christchurch, (Alps clouded over); Avoca Valley; Castle Rock and The Tors; Rapaki and Quail Island. On top of Witch Hill was a WW1 memorial stone bench, with two bronze plaques above the bench, topped by crenellations. The top bronze plaque quoted Rupert Brooke's poem "The Dead:"
"Blow out, you bugles, over the rich dead!...
And we have come into our heritage."
Rupert Brooke died of blood poisoning on his way to Gallipoli.
The bottom bronze plaque facing Christchurch recorded the names of seven "English" Kiwis from Christchurch, and where they died: Messines (2), France (2), Laventi (1), Gallipoli (1), Magdhabar Syria (1). The memorial gave me shelter from the cold wind. Behind the memorial, facing Rapaki, a third bronze plaque recorded the names of two Maori soldiers from Rapaki who died in Gallipoli and Auckland. I thought the separate bronze plaques insulted all those soldiers who died for King and Country. Why were English and Maori names on separate bronze plaques? It reminded me of Indians and Zulus riding in the back seats of "white" buses in Durban during the 1950s, before Indians and Zulus were later forced to ride in their own Green Mamba buses separated from red whitey buses during apartheid.
2008 From Top of Witch Hill: Rapaki Track on Montgomery Spur, above Avoca Valley, Port Hills, Christchurch
2008 Top of Witch Hill view: Rapaki, Quail Island, Charteris Bay, Mount Bradley on Banks Peninsular, Head of the Bay, Governors Bay
After walking about Witch Hill's rocky plateau, and snapping Castle Rock and The Tors, Rapaki and Quail Island, and Avoca Valley again, I walked down Rapaki Track with the southerly on my back. I passed two walkers going up and several mountain bikers riding up or down. Near the end of Rapaki Track, I went left down Rogers Track and zig-zagged down to Mount Vernon Reserve carpark. On the way down, I passed a man slogging upwards, leashed to his Alsation. My descent from Witch Hill took 1 hour.
See Kei Ripper
See Cleansing Ceremony by Sangoma Witch Doctors in SA
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