If you are looking for an interesting and varied suburban walk that is straightforward to get to, not crowded, has plenty of parking, an open contactless cafe (an added bonus) and you may not have been to for a while, Totara Park and the Botanic Gardens can tick all the boxes. Both Kay and Linda have led walks here.  

There are a number of entrances to Totara Park, but we accessed it through the Botanic Gardens, just off the Manurewa/Hill Road exit (exit 451) of SH1. We wanted to first have a wander around the spring flowers - both natives and exotics, which are spectacular at the moment. Council gardeners and volunteers have clearly been hard at work throughout lockdown and we saw quite a number of them toiling away. 

The Botanic Gardens are vast - around 64 hectares (158 acres) and divided into different garden types - African Plants, Edible Garden, Harakeke Collection, Rose Garden, Threatened Native Plants and many more. I recommend walking through the Palm Garden, a shady pathway that looks almost subtropical in parts. This leads to the Gondwana Arboretum containing descendants of ancient tree species such as conifers, cycads and ferns that lived in the time of the dinosaurs.  

The Puhinui Stream Forest Trail links Totara Park to the Botanic Gardens. There are three entrances from the gardens. The trail follows the Puhinui Stream through lush native forest with puriri, totara, nikau, kowhai and kauri. It’s a loop track but has a number of short minor tracks through it.  This includes one with a long series of steep heart and lung-challenging steps to a lookout….. which was closed.  

Strange as it may seem in lockdown, we were out of time after finishing the forest trail, but plan to go back and explore the area further. 

Wear good water-proof walking shoes as some of the tracks, both in the park and the gardens are wet and muddy. It’s well sign-posted with maps at regular intervals. 

Kim H 

Click here to see Kim’s photos