A balmy spring afternoon brought out 27 people for a pleasant walk over the rolling fields of Shakespear Park at the end of Auckland’s Whangaparaoa Peninsula. We Left The Bracken soon after 1:30pm and met more people at the carpark at Army Bay at 2pm. After the usual prayer and introduction, we set out following the bush section of the Heritage Trail as it followed up a small stream. This eventually came out into open pasture, and we carried on up to the summit of the park. On the highest point in the park was a lookout tower, from which we had a panoramic view all around - Whangaparaoa and Manly to the west, Rangitoto Island and Auckland city with the Sky Tower to the south, and Tiritiri Matangi Island to the east. We followed the Lookout Track across paddocks full of cows to drop down to Te Haruhi Bay, the second of our three afternoon tea stops. One of the pohutukawa trees behind Te Haruhi Bay was already beginning to flower, to remind everyone that Christmas was just 9 weeks and 4 days away. Passing the old woolshed, we climbed back up to the hilltops to rejoin the Heritage Trail track and drop down to our final rest stop at Okoromai Bay.

A short level walk past wetlands brought us back to our cars to bring a lovely summery walk to an end.

COST: $6 .