CASCADE CREEK.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18389, 3 May 1923, Page 12

CASCADE CREEK.

AUCKLAND BEAUTY SPOT. A LITTLE-KNOWN WALK. / .',' BT J. N. KEALT, JTJNB. The recent announcement that residents had petitioned the City Council to secure the preservation of the bush at Cascade Creek in the Waitakere calls to mind several trips to this beauty, spot, which, like so many others, although so near, seems to be very little known to Aueklanders. Indeed, I have been told that when, about a year ago a party, members of the council, went to look at it, not knowing the track, they let themselves down the precipice on ropes. Actually, however, to anyone fond of walking, the place is quite easy to find, being only about six miles from, Swanson. To a lover of the open country, of the bush,- of the ferns, and of the streams, the trip is very well worth making, the bush surpassing even that at Titirangi. Given a good spring or summer day, tho whole journey is ideal. One begins (or should) by putting on one's oldest clothes, packing a good lunch, and catching the ? a.m. train to Swanson. Arrived there, the old West ('oast Road to Bethel's is followed for about four miles, until a bridge is reached where the roada courtesy title only—forks. As you aro in Waitemata County, you are, of course, informed by a calico sign that the bridge is unsafe, and you cross at your; owit risk. Taking the risk, the right hand fork is followed and in course of time a gate is reached and the road gradually gives place to a set of cart ruts and some boulders. After another half-mile or so the Waitakere River is reached,, where it emerges from the bush into cleared land, some distance below the falls, and here is the ideal lunch spot. Green grass, singing water, squawking parrakeets, gambol- j ling rabbits, the song of a distant tui— a- good lunch. What more could man desire. ; Then for the bush. Walking up the right hand bank of the river, through a little valley, luxuriant with ferns, mkaus, and all the varieties of native tree imaginable, with the tinkle of the stream below, and glorious kauris rising all about. Slow progress is made, now through the bush, now over the boulders fringing the stream, now over parts of the dry bed itself—for the river is not so large as it_ was, now that ,a city is being fed from it —until a point is reached where a small creek runs into the river. We turn up here through a valley ever growing narrower, up a port of funnel shut in by living green, whose centre is the bed of the little creek, with its bright mosses and orchids, its fallen tree trunks covered with lycopodium, and its innumerable small cascades, each one of which forms the perfect setting for a picture or a photograph. At every turn fresh beauties await us. All this time the face of tho country is changing. Ever as we rise the track, if such it can be called, grows more difficult, the outcrops of rock more frequent, the valley narrower, and the splashing of the water louder" • '■" " ■''■ A Weird SpoS. A few minutes more of scrambling, this time round loose rocks nearly as large as houses, and the goal is reached. And what a place it is! On every side rise walls of' rock, to meet, at last, in a huge, Gothic arch. '200 ft. or more overhead. • Round about a few sickly-looking, shrub* still strive for life, with the clinging green moss PS, which are wet as sponges with tho drips from overhead, while directly underfoot, as one stands on a large rock, - is 8. round pool of cold water, clear as glass, into one end of which, like a monstrous showerbath, pours the cascade from which the valley takes its name. . '. ' ' ' In the dim light' the spot is indeed weird, and little effort of the imagination Is required to people it with ghosts and goblins, evil spirits, :.s and even the grim Taniwha of Maori legend. Though the total height of the: cascade must be close on two hundred feet, only the lower fifteen feet or so is visible, aU the. other port being hidden in the caves and crevices of the rock, the sound alone indicating the direction of the flow high up overhead. The rock itself is of that peculiar/ " pudding formation : seen so much on the west coast, giving the impression that here, in th beginning of time, some battle of the Titans must have taken place and that their missiles, from pebbles the size of a man's hand to boulders hundreds of pounds in weight, had been thrown so hard that they had half-buried themselves in the ; '- cliff-face and remained there to this day. Such a battle as Hiawatha fought' with Mndjekeewis when,the world was young. However, if' here the Titans fought they are now with us no longer, while; the goblins, brownies, and taniwhas, refuse to show themselves to European eye and except for the all-pervading rumble of the falling water and the dashing of the spray, there is stillness even greater than that of the surrounding bush, and the air feels cold as an ice-chest. _■-.- " ■ - ' , Nature Reigns Supreme. V Not even the call of a bird breaks the solitude, and of animal life there is none. Though man-made desolation stretches all around, .here, at least, Nature reigns supreme. , The spot in which we now stand is safe. Nature has fashioned for herself a stronghold as impregnable as the rock of Gibraltar: and as enduring. It is not for this gorge, but for the surrounding valley that one fears. . But it/ grows late, and we must now retrace our steps, and as we do so how great th© contrast. It is as if .we walked from June into November, from winter into spring, and all our solemn thoughts grow light again, as we come back, to ; the bush and. the sunny stream, for which a new measure of respect is felt after one has seen a little of its origin. And so on again and down, until once more the Waitakere River is reached, and soon afterwards the cleared land and human habitations. Here, too, is sadness, for un tho hillsides all around run the great black scars of recent burns, and one hopes that steps will be taken to save the little' valley just quitted from the match and the axe, and to preserve it for all time as a sanctuary, for all too little of the bush remains to us.

Then as the sun begins ,to sot, once more we turn toward home., up to the crest of. the hill, pausing every few minutes to look back at-each of the glorious views that burst out suddenly on turning every corner of road. Now the west coast surf is seen between the peaks of two bills, now a stretch of bush, and now the bluo smoke curling lazily from the kitchen chimney of some small bush farm let. A little farther on a team o:E bullocks is passed, slowly but surely dragging some fallen forest giant to its ultimate fate at the sawmill.

Once more tho view changes. The top of the hill is readied, just as darkness begins to fall, and we begin the long descent. First is seen a wide panorama of green country and blue harbours, slowly changing before our eyes to light and darker blues, through which faint at first, but quickly growing stronger, the lights of the distant city twinkle one by one—a fairy city -in a fairy setting. And still down we go, until -at last, arrived once more at the railway station, a day well spent—with Nature and with Godcomes to its close.