The fantail glided through, swerving in and out of the trees, goal in sight. It liked to follow the humans walking along the trail, up until where the forest breaks out into the harsh windy grass lands. Every-time you went up to the top of the hill, on the way back it would be there. The same one? Who knows. But it never disappointed.
I remember back when I was younger, we lived on the inner side of an extinct volcano, Governors Bay. There was a cafe on top of the hill, it was damaged in the earthquakes, but I believe it is not repaired. We would walk up to the top of the hills, and sit down in the cafe. You would have a view over the entirety of Christchurch. Machines operated on the other side of the hill, tearing down all the trees. They were making space for a bike park. The walk itself was steep, well thats what I remember from the past but everything seems steep when your little.
The track itself was covered in roots, surrounded by beautiful trees. It was cool in the shade, the air was pure and untouched by pollution. We used to go up there after school, in the weekends, holidays. It was full of nature, animals, berry bushes and the fantail. He would follow us home, it seemed like almost every time we went up to the top of the port hills he would follow us back. Sometimes it would build up confidence and get a bit closer. If you stopped for a break it would come and perch on a rock a few metres away from you. Its tail was the brightest white. The bird itself wasn’t very big, but it was super friendly. Sometimes we would feed it the crusts of our sandwich.
3 Years later, on a returning trip to Christchurch, Indy and I, we had hiked up to the top of the port hills and viewed all the changes, the bike park had completely teared down half the forest, destroying the home to the fantails. The cafe rebuilt and pollution covered the forest. Private tracks had been released to the public, coffee cups, wrappers and boxes of sorts covered the forest. As we got deeper into the forest it was worse. The once clean air had been corrupted. We had walked down the hill that day, and the fantail wasn’t to be seen.