Yesterday morning Austin asked me to take a photo of his terraces, because the light showed them off so nicely. I complied.
Turned out this was the first of many photos I took of those terraces yesterday, because …. I climbed the mountain!
Starting from HERE. Please note the pine trees on the top, and the grassy ridge that extends to the right. (I hope some of you are going to be impressed.)
Junia, two lovely guests (Sandra and Christopher) and I started by walking in the dry stream bed. Sandra wanted to soak up the forest and I saw a flower that was new to me. A CASSAVA flower. Surprise.
This is the cassava fruit. Who’d have guessed?
Enough now of lollygagging – I needed to get up that hill while I still had some steam.
Once we climbed up the ridge above the nearly-dry waterfall, I could see we this had …..t—h—i—-s … far to go. Junia promised it was a ridge all the way. I wasn’t going to have to go down, and then go back up.
I also looked back – could not see our house.
I caught my breath and kept hiking.
Next time I looked back – I zoomed in and found our house.
See the terraces! From now on I will have a yellow circle around our house, but won’t mention it again.
Here is a lookback from higher up.
And a lookback from what could have been my turn-back spot – a lovely leafy tree where I sat for at least 10 minutes.
Maybe 20-30 meters (60-90 feet) uphill from the tree was a fence and a gate.
Here’s the gate. And guess what ….
I WAS FIRST! (only because Junia and Christopher were talking something and Sandra was taking photos.) There was still another hill between us and the top.
FINALLY – the top of the mountain! We are now in the pines.
I really, really wanted to stop here – but Junia wouldn’t hear of it. Not much farther we came upon this ginger that Junia said was good for sunburns. I put some on, and also got the idea of taking off my shoes. That made a world of difference. Without them I could carry on with no complaint to the end of the ridge.
Here was the view from the ridge. Way in the distance you will see the little yellow circle.
Our companions had a rest in the shade.
When I finally joined them in the shade, I saw I was joined by my favorite flora “frenemy” – mimosa pudica, a.k.a. sensitive plant. I love to hate it, and can entertain myself for hours uprooting it. I was happy to see it on the top of the hill with me.
Junia took a celebration photo of Sandra, Christopher and me at the top – TA DA.
Coming down the mountain, I was happy to stop and look at flora. Here is a fruit that Junia showed us. When fully yellow – fully ripe – it is very delicious, like passion fruit but better. But you have to be very fast because the birds really go for them. He showed us many empty yellow skins. Finally, he found a ripe one, two ripe ones!
WOW! It was small, but VERY delicious. Like passion fruit plus mangosteen.
It was so sunny and so hot and so rocky with loose sandy stretches. I was so happy and exhausted when I got back to the shady stream bed. This flower kept me company during one rest.
These red berries at another.
Frankly by this point, I was wondering if I’d be able to make it up the last little hill to our house. I jokingly thought of telling Junia to have Austin get me at the bottom of the road with the truck. I needed salt – badly. “I need a sports drink,” I told Junia.
“I’ll get you a drinking coconut,” he said.
The thought of the drinking coconut really inspired me to go the last short distance to the bottom of our hill.
Aaaaaaahhhh! Words cannot describe!!
And I got back up our little hill to our house with no trouble at all.
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