Newlands Forest Contour Path (9/9)

No pictures for this one!  Bridget and I set off from Newlands forest station parking at about 1.30pm, past the fire fighting helicopters and up the Littlewort trail. The first feathered attraction was an elusive group of red rumbed Swee Waxbills flittering through the fynbos. Further up we came across a few pairs of my favourite little forest bird, the Cape Batis, warning each other of our presence with their rattling alarm calls. We crossed the stream and continued on the left bank, following the route that I have often done with the Thursday VOB trail group, and eventually reached the contour path, after much more uphill, and took a break at the Ascension Gully stream.

I love this magnificent contour path and its boardwalks through forested ancient screes of mossy boulders and ferny undergrowth under the indigenous tree canopy. The thickest and tallest forest giants we have yet to identify, but we were alarmed at how many of another smaller trees species had been subjected to bark stripping (presumably for the muti/herbalist trade). Most had been sealed later by with a black potion but some had clearly been attacked again after the black gum had been applied.

After Newlands Ravine and the tree house picnic spot, we passed Dark Gorge and First Waterfall Ravine, the cleared area with ericas and watsonias flowering, and entered the blue gum forests flanked on the left by the steep cliffs of the Graafwater mudstones and shales. Beyond that section, we made our tea spot on a soft fynbos bank not very far from the u-turn before the Blockhouse.

After tea and biscuits we took the rather overgrown diagonal path back down the bracken dominated slopes to the upper jeep track, which we followed down into Newland Forest and back to our start.

Distance about 7.3 km.  Time 2 h 55 m. Climb 400 m.