008 Tree Tops and Dinosaurs

February 6, 2021

Black clouds, cool weather and shrouded hills greeted us this morning, but no rain, not yet anyway, though there is some pending early next week. We drove 15 minutes south of Hokitika to the Tree Tops Walk a gigantic steel walkway 20 metres above the forest floor. It was an exhilarating stroll above the mature West Coast rainforest featuring rimu and kamahi trees among many others. With our hearts aflutter and adrenalin high (neither of us is 'heights' happy) we climbed to the top of the Hokitika Tower - 47 metres up to the viewing platform. The view was great and well worth the angst to be able to see across richly diverse forest foliage to Lake Mahinapua, the Southern Alps (only just), and the Tasman Sea.

Driving on after a coffee break, we travelled south through magnificent forests and flat, scrubby long-land cattle farms in stark contrast to the mountains to our left. And everywhere, colour: wide expanses of glacial icy-blue waters sided by grey shingle banks; prolific bright orange flowers; purple clover; yellow buttercups; golden dandelions; and of course the rich greens and browns of the foliage.

135kms from Hokitika we trundled into Franz Josef village to the West Coast Wildlife Centre which is run in partnership with the Department of Conservation to incubate and raise New Zealand's rarest kiwis, the Rowi found only in the nearby Okarito forest, and the Haast kiwi. The programme is extensive and very successful. We paid to go behind the scenes to learn about the fascinating kiwi hatching endeavour. We learned a lot!

We also got close up and personal to some tuatara (our NZ lizard for you folk overseas), except it is not a lizard at all, but the world's oldest living dinosaur with a lineage dating back 200 million years! Tuatara were considered extinct until a few were discovered on local offshore islands and introduced back onto the mainland in 2005 when a breeding programme was launched.

Its been a busy day, but such an interesting one. Tonight we are at NZMCA camp Franz Josef.



Walkway

Walkway


Walkway



Take the first step!

Tower 47 metres from the forest floor 

We made it!

Epiphytes


Rowi Kiwi Chick

Tuatara

Franz Josef Wildlife Centre















Comments

  1. Anita17 March 2021 at 01:57

    Wow, wow wow. I know about your trepidation about height. Well done both of you. What a magnificent walkway. That was awesome to read about and see the photos. Again wow and well done to you both.

    ReplyDelete

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