39: Colonial Knob Hike (Elsdon, Porirua)

I woke up this morning to a beautiful New Zealand winter day. Pristine conditions with clear blue skies and and crisp winds blowing from the northwest. This past week was particularly heavy in the work department, so after finishing up some projects at home, I decided to venture out and take a hike (tramp in kiwi terminology) to the summit of Colonial Knob. I'd heard about it and read a few things on it, and amazingly for the past 9 months that I've been living here in Titahi Bay, I somehow managed to evade this mountain literally in my back yard (not on purpose, though). As with nearly everything I do, I always have a digital camera on hand to capture the action. Most of my friends live in Wellington and with the price of fuel these days at $2.12 per litre (or $6.70 USD per gallon), it's hard to attract any exercise buddies up this way. Click on each photo for larger view.