Tracks and signage along the way made it sound complicated: up Bowenvale Valley Track; up Bowenvale Walkway to Summit Road; along Bowenvale Traverse Track at the valley head below Summit Road; down Latters Spur Track below Victoria Park; down East Side Bush Track; rejoin Bowenvale Valley Track back to my car - a big circular walk.
Starting off I saw nine grey old ladies emerge from Bowenvale Valley Track, all with similar backpacks; similar boots and hats; similar aluminium adjustable walking sticks, one leashed to a corgi; all staggering to their cars, and I knew it would be one of those walks. I just walked in jandals, shorts, T shirt and backpack. A starting wooden sign stated:
BOWENVALE
RECREATION RESERVE
TRACK INFORMATION 450m
NO PARKING BEYOND THIS POINT
PLEASE ENJOY YOUR VISIT
A black and red metal sign stated:
NO
VEHICLES
PAST THIS POINT
A male jogger jogged out of the wide gravel track. Like at Huntsbury Track, wooden power poles had strips of metal around each pole at head height, to stop Aussie possums climbing poles.
At the first metal gate and wooden stile two male mountain bikers (MTBs) passed me and manhandled their bikes over the gate. A red and white sign on the gate ordered:
MOUNTAIN BIKERS!
IF TRACKS ARE WET DONT RIDE
IF YOU RIDE IN THE WET YOU CAN WRECK ALL THE GOOD WORK
DONE BY VOLUNTEERS WHO MAINTAIN
AND DEVELOP THE TRACKS. THINK ABOUT IT!
PORT HILLS RANGER SERVICE
CHRISTCHURCH CITY COUNCIL
YOUR PEOPLE YOUR CITY
While I read the signs, two slim women in blue tights and tops climbed over the stile and vanished in a waft of perfume. Two stinky male joggers followed them, the smell of sweat and eucalyptus oil fumes from gums above nauseated. Another male jogger nipped past, while I read the ATTENTION ALL DOGS... green sign I'd seen before on Huntsbury Track. I loathed the signs and crowds even before I started.
2008. After the start of Bowenvale Valley Track, Port Hills, Christchurch
I caught up with the male jogger while he pissed under a gum tree. I studied the information board about Bowenvale Valley and Victoria Park tracks carefully. Another male walker passed me going down.
I passed beside two locked gates, each with a rectangle of red aluminium attached. A male jogging down smiled at me. His black mongrel smiled too. I passed beside a fourth locked gate with a red tag on it. Gates stopped vehicles, but allowed walkers, joggers, and MTBs to pass next to the gate. Bowenvale Valley Track narrowed with tussock grass on the left slope and dead gorse on the right.
2008. Looking down Bowenvale Valley Track towards Christchurch. Note metal strips on power poles to discourage Aussie possums
At a fifth locked gate I climbed over a wooden stile, and on the downward side of the gate a red and white sign with black lettering yelled:
MOUNTAIN BIKERS!
PLEASE CONTROL YOUR SPEED
AND GIVE WAY TO WALKERS
PORT HILLS RANGER SERVICE
I wondered how speeding MTBs could possible read the small signs?
2008. Junction: Hidden Valley Track left & Bowenvale Valley Track right
Bowenvale Valley Track forked by a wooden HIDDEN VALLEY TRACK sign pointing left. Nearby a green and beige plastic sign stated:
CHRISTCHURCH CITY COUNCIL
THIS TRACK IS PROVIDED FOR
YOUR ENJOYMENT
PLEASE RESPECT AND PROTECT
THE PLANTS AND WILDLIFE
(Series of pics with forbidden lines through some)
TAKE ONLY PHOTOGRAPHS. LEAVE ONLY FOOTPRINTS
By a sheep grid and fence another sign in brown lettering and beige aluminium stated:
PRIVATE LAND AHEAD
WALKING AND MTB
ACCESS PERMITTED AT
YOUR OWN RISK
ACCESS MAY BE
CLOSED IN WINTER
FOR STOCK FEEDING
THANK YOU
PORT HILLS RANGER SERVICE
2008. Cabbage Tree down Bowenvale Valley Track just before the pine forest
At the start of a pine forest, three more signs were on the sixth locked gate. A dry steam bed ran between rocky cliffs, and in the forest on the trackside, amongst red plastic cones, two more signs on poles facing down the track screamed:
CAUTION
SLOW DOWN
PORT HILLS RANGER SERVICE
2008. Unsigned track going up from Bowenvale Valley Track towards Victoria Park, Port Hills
By one of the signs on my right I saw a wide stony track with wooden steps going up through the pine forest, but no sign stated what the track was! The seventh locked gate had a sign and red aluminium tag on it.
Sugarloaf loomed above, as the forest thinned into a mallow wasteland sprinkled with purple foxgloves, where pines had been chopped down on both sides of the valley. ("Please respect and protect the plants and wildlife?")
Where Bowenvale Valley Track forked again, with walkers going left and MTBs going right, another sign bellowed:
CAUTION
DOWNHILL MTB TRACK
CROSSES AHEAD
OTHER USERS PLEASE GIVE WAY
PORT HILLS RANGER SERVICE
Given the plethora of signs on the shared track, it was obvious that downward speeding MTBs were a big problem. Pylons on both sides of the valley threaded 220 000 volt wires across Bowenvale Valley. Once shot of the MTBs and pine forest, Bowenvale Valley Track narrowed and pleasantly zig-zagged over three wooden bridges crossing the dry stream bed.
When I climbed over a wooden fence stile I saw flax plantings up on the left side of the valley. When I stepped up and over the fourth wooden bridge, I saw Sugarloaf and Summit Road up ahead.
Following the stream bed I saw more flax plantings and native plants like manuka and griselinia, amongst tussock grass, but also green gorse and bindweed. I crossed a couple more wooden bridges, and on a rocky knoll above stood a lone pine. At a T junction, by the tracks a wooden sign stated:
BOWENVALE WALKWAY
TO BOWENVALE AV
20 MINS
As I'd been on the Bowenvale Valley Track for an hour, I must've spent 40 minutes reading all the signs. Another wooden sign lying on the grass stated:
BOWENVALE WALKWAY
TO SUMMIT ROAD
35 MINS
VICTORIA PARK VIA
EAST SIDE BUSH
30 MINS
2008. Junction: Bowenvale Walkway going left towards Victoria Park & Bowenvale Valley Track on right
Bowenvale Walkway became narrow and rocky, and while I snapped down Bowenvale Valley the two sexy women bumped into me, giggling and chatty, on their way down. "Whoops!" I said. "Sorry I'm deaf." They continued on their way to Victoria Park.
Bowenvale Walkway went up through flax, tussock and a cool breeze. After I crossed another small bridge, a male jogger passed me going up towards Summit Road. Thereafter Bowenvale Walkway zig-zagged and got steeper and wider, full of sheep dung, but no sheep.
I'd walked over tons of dry, black, sheep dung on Farm Track, Huntsbury Track and Bowenvale Tracks. In wet weather dung would decompose into compost. In dry, summer, windy weather faeces would blow over houses on the hills, polluting people, food, clothes, cars and gardens.
2008. About half way up Bowenvale Walkway with Victoria Park & Christchurch behind
2008. Top of Bowenvale Walkway below Summit Road, with Scott Scenic Reserve behind
2008. Below Summit Road: Start of Bowenvale Traverse across Bowenvale Valley head, continuing from top of Bowenvale Walkway, with Larva Flow Ridge, Huntsbury Hill & Christchurch behind
Trackside was tussock and Californian thistle, till I reached Bowenvale Traverse Track and a locked gate and wooden stile over a fence to Summit Road. I sat on the stile, drinking CocaCola, and snapped Bowenvale Valley below and Huntsbury Hill in the distance on my right.
2008. From Summit Road: Sugarloaf & TV Transmitter on top of Port Hills, above Bowenvale Valley
At the Summit Road carpark I saw pinickers scoffing a late lunch, while I snapped Sugarloaf. Below in the caldera I snapped Dyers Pass and Governors Bay.
2008. From Summit Road carpark: overlooking Crater Rim towards Dyers Pass, Governors Bay, Head of the Bay & Banks Peninsula
2008. Latters Spur Track near the end of Bowenvale Traverse, going down Bowenvale Valley above MTB Jump Park
A male MTB passed me on the narrow stony Bowenvale Traverse Track. I enjoyed looking down on the tracks I'd just climbed, while I passed tussock and Californian thistle. A breeze up the valley kept me cool, while I walked below Sugarloaf until Bowenvale Traverse Track divided into three sheep grids, without a single sign.
I took the right track down wide stone steps into a pine forest down the valley. By sheep in a paddock a small sign stated LATTERS SPUR TRACK, which led me to the MTB JUMP PARK amongst trees on my left. In a sunny glade beyond MTB JUMP PARK, I came across four male MTBs and a female jogger who eyed me warily.
2008. Victoria Park Information Board surrounded by 7 tracks, with MTB Jump Park behind
I had the choice of seven tracks: one to my left, one straight ahead, and five on my right going down the valley. Choosing the non-MTB Latters Spur Track (unsigned) passing under a pylon, I zig-zagged through cool pine forest, sprinkled with macrocarpa and gums, till I came across a junction with wooden signs: EAST SIDE BUSH TRACK, a continuation of the LATTERS SPUR TRACK I was on; VICTORIA PARK; BOWENVALE AVENUE.
2008. Sheep grid, locked gate & MTB caution signs on the way down Bowenvale Valley Track
I took BOWENVALE AVENUE TRACK which zig-zagged down the pine forest to BOWENVALE VALLEY TRACK I'd started on, rejoining at the CAUTION signs and steps I'd seen earlier. I encountered three male MTBs speeding down, and thirteen male MTBs sweating upwards.
As it was late afternoon, they were after-work, fitness fanatics. Most wore helmets, but two had helmets attached to backpacks for use on the down race. Two joggers passed me going up, one using a map, another leashed to a spaniel.
The circular walk took me about three hours, excluding snap stops and reading all the signs.
2008. Alpha & Omega of Bowenvale Valley Track & Bowenvale Avenue, Christchurch
Content & pics Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.
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