A walk in one of the regional parks and forests is a great way to explore the diverse landscape of greater Wellington.

    From coastal sands to historic paths,farmland to green native forest,the parks and forests offer a variety of countryside and scenery to suit all ages and levels of fitness.

    Most of the walks offer the chance to take a break and enjoy picnicking or swimming.

What to take

    Many of the walks go through areas exposed to winds and changeable weather.Please take with you some water and sun hat especially on walks marked with hiking symbol.Always take some warm clothing and a rain jacket.

All times stated are estimates for the return trip.

    Where indicated, mountain bikes and horses riders may use tracks.

Opening hours

    The parks and forests are open daily from 8 am till dusk.Parks or walks marked with a farm animal symbol may be closed for lambing Aug—Nov.Please check with the ranger or on our website www.gw.govt.nz.

Caring for your pack

●Pack in and pack out.Take your rubbish home and recycle it when possible.

●Keep dogs under control and remove droppings.

●Do not remove, disturb or damage native plants or animals.

●Light no fires.

●Poison may be laid in the parks and forests to control the field mouse.Do not remove notice or disturb baits, lures, trapping lines or the mousetraps.

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    Washington, D.C. Bicycle Tours

    Cherry Blossom Bike Tour in Washington, D.C.

    Duration: 3 hours

    This small group bike tour is a fantastic way to see a world-famous cherry trees with beautiful flowers of Washington, D.C. Your guide will provide a history lesson about the trees and the famous monuments where they blossom. Reserve your spot before availability — the cherry blossoms—disappear!

    Washington Capital Monuments Bicycle Tour

    Duration: 3 hours (4 miles)

    Join a guided bike tour and view some of the most popular monuments in Washington, D.C. Explore the monuments and memorials on the National Mall as your guide shares unique facts and history at each stop. Guided tour includes bike, helmet, cookies and bottled water.

    Capital City Bike Tour In Washington, D.C.

    Duration: 3 hours

    Morning or Afternoon, this bike tour is the perfect tour for D. C. newcomers and locals looking to experience Washington, D.C. in a healthy way with minimum effort. Knowledgeable guides will entertain you with the most, interesting stories about Presidents, Congress, memorials, and parks. Comfortable bikes and a smooth tour route(路线) make cycling between the sites fun and relaxing.

Washington Capital Sites at Night Bicycle Tour

    Duration: 3 hours (7miles)

    Join a small group bike tour for an evening of exploration in the heart of Washington, D.C. Get up close to the monuments and memorials as you bike the sites of Capitol Hill and the National Mall. Frequent stops are made for photo taking as your guide offers unique facts and history. Tour includes bike, helmet, and bottled water. All riders are equipped with reflective vests and safety lights.

    Reading may be fundamental, but how the brain gives meaning to letters on a page has been a mystery. Two new studies fill in some details on how the brains of efficient readers handle words. One of the studies, published in the April 30 Neuron, suggests that a visual-processing area of the brain recognizes common words as whole units. Another study, published online April 27 in PLOSONE, makes it known that the brain operates two fast parallel systems for reading, linking visual recognition of words to speech.

    Maximilian Riesenhuber, a neuroscientist at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., wanted to know whether the brain reads words letter by letter or recognizes words as whole objects. He and his colleagues showed sets of real words or nonsense(无意义的词语)words to volunteers undergoing fMRI scans. The words differed in only one letter, such as “farm” and “form” or “soat” and “poat”, or were completely different, such as “farm” and “coat” or “poat” and “hime”. The researchers were particularly interested in what happens in the visual word form area, or VWFA, an area on the left side of the brain just behind the ear that is involved in recognizing words.

    Riesenhuber and his colleagues found that neurons(神经元)in the VWFA respond strongly to changes in real words. Changing “farm” to “form”, for example, produced as great a change in activity as changing “farm” to” coat”, the team reports in Neuron. The area responded slowly to single-letter changes in made-up words.

    The data suggests that readers grasp real words as whole objects, rather than focusing on letters or letter combinations. And as a reader's exposure to a word increases, the brain comes to recognize the shape of the word. Meaning is passed on after recognition in the brain, Riesenhuber says.

    The researchers don't yet know how longer and less familiar words are recognized, or if the brain can be trained to recognize nonsense words as a unit.

A Different Kind of Spring Break

    For many American university students, the week-long spring break holiday means an endless part on a sunny beach in Florida or Mexico. In Panama City Beach, Florida, a city with a permanent population of approximately 36,000, more than half a million university students arrive during the month of March to play and party, making it the number one spring break destination in the United States.

    A week-long drinking binge is not for everyone, however, and a growing number of American university students have found a way to make spring break matter. For them, joining or leading a group of volunteers to travel locally or internationally and work to address problems such as poverty, homelessness, or environmental damage makes spring break a unique learning experience that university students can feel good at.

    During one spring break week, students at James Madison University in Virginia participated in 15 "alternative spring break" trips to nearby states, three others to more distant parts of the United States, and five international trips. One group of JMU students traveled to Bogalusa, Louisiana, to help rebuild homes damaged by Hurricane Katrina. Another group traveled to Mississippi to organize creative activities for children living in a homeless shelter. One group of students did go to Florida, but not to lie on the sand. They performed exhausting physical labor such as maintaining roving invasive plant species that threaten the native Florida ecosystem.

    Students who participate in alternative spring break projects find them very rewarding. While most university students have to get their degrees before they can start helping people, student volunteers are able to help people now. On the other hand, the accommodations are far from glamorous. Students often sleep on the floor of a school or church, or spend the week camping in tents. But students only pay around $250 for meals and transportation, which is much less than some of their peers spend to travel to more traditional spring break hot spot.

    You can't always predict a heavy rain or remember your umbrella. But designer Mikhail Belvacv doesn't think that forgetting to check the weather forecast before heading out should result in you getting wet.

    That's why he created Lampbrella, a lamp post with its own rain sensing umbrella.

    The designer says he came up with the idea after watching people get wet on streets in Russia. "Once, I was driving on a central Saint Petersburg street and saw the street lamps lighting up people trying to hide from the rain. I thought it would be appropriate to have a canopy(伞蓬) built into a street lamp," he said.

    The Lampbrella is a standard-looking street lamp fitted with an umbrella canopy. It has a built-in electric motor which can open or close the umbrella on demand. Sensors (传感器)then ensure that the umbrella offers pedestrians shelter whenever it starts raining.

    In addition to the rain sensor, there's also a 360 motion sensor on the fiberglass street lamp which detects whether anyone's using the Lampbrella. After three minutes of not being used the canopy is closed.

    According to the designer, the Lampbrella would move at a relatively low speed, so as not to cause harm to the pedestrians. Besides, it would be grounded to protect from possible lighting strike. Each Lampbrella would offer enough shelter for several people. Being installed at 2 meters off the ground it would only be a danger for the tallest of pedestrians.

    While there are no plans to take Lampbrella into production, Belyaev says he recently introduced his creation to one Moscow Department and insists this creation should be installed on the street where a lot of people walk but there are no canopies to provide shelter.

    Last year, when our three-year-old great-granddaughter Kylie was taken to see Santa Claus, she made sure to give him her wish list of toys. A week later, she ran into a different Santa in a mall. He stopped to ask what she wanted for Christmas. Kylie was surprised and let him know: "If you can't remember what I told you last week, how are you going to remember on Christmas Eve?!"

(Mary Paul, Milwaukee, Wisconsin)

    As my son Mike and I drove to the mall, we passed a Salvation Army Santa ringing his bell. "Mike," I said, "there's Santa!" He shook his head. "That's just some guy in a Santa suit," he said. It saddened me to think that maybe my son no longer believed in Santa, and we drove the rest of the way in silence. At the mall, we spotted another Santa greeting young believers. Suddenly, Mike took off toward him. Turning back to me, he shouted. "Now, there's the real Santa!"

(Michael E. Fahey, Huntley, Illinois)

    We immigrated to America from China when I was six. Because I was shy and didn't speak English, I had few friends. My days were spent at home with my brother. Sometimes we'd help our neighbor Mr. Mueller pull weeds. One Christmas Day, there was a knock at the door. Grandma opened it, and there stood a big fellow in red with a snow-white beard, laughing, "Ho, ho, ho!" He handed out presents and made us laugh. I had so much fun. It was years later when I learned that our special Santa was our neighbor Mr. Mueller.

(Joanne Tang, Litchfield Park, Arizona)