It's a track I have walked for over 18 years that leads from the road along the Tutukaka Coast down to the spectacular little beach at Whale Bay. It's a gentle sloping walk to go down to the beach and a demanding return journey.
I first walked it when I was 8 months pregnant, along with my husband and 5 kids aged less than 2 1/2 up to 12years. That was the first year we camped at Woolleys Bay in Mr Woolley's front farm paddock, February 1996. We have gone back virtually every year since.
This track has lots of memories for me
- it's where one of our boys fell off the edge and slid down the sheer cliff about 50mt grabbing onto scrub as he went, bleating out my name.
- it's close-by to where one of our girls was proposed to by her husband - she's now days away from giving birth to her second child.
- it's where I first read the text from my Mum telling me she had killed a snake in her kitchen the evening before by spraying fly spray in its face then pounding it till dead with her meat mallet - she was 88!
- it's where conversations about the unknown of the coming year have taken place with our kids, as they have gone to school for the first time at age 16.
- it's where we have stopped most years, climbed down the slope to the lookout and taken family photographs.
- it's where I have been lost in thought about a whole manner of things - thinking about the past, thinking about the future. It's a pretty and picturesque track to walk to get lost on.
In three months time we will be there again, having the same conversations with my last son about starting school, taking another family photo - hard to get everyone there at the same time these days, and lots of thinking for me as my home schooling career will be finished and new routines opening up.
You are welcome to have a look at my website ~
A WAY TO PARENT - www.awaytoparent.com
Cathy
No comments:
Post a Comment