The scenic trip to Nelson and the Pelouris River

West of Havelock, the Pelouris river carves its path through an lush, old forest reserve. We stopped at the car park hereon the way to Nelson and hiked the half mile trek to the suspension bridge spanning the river. There were 15 feet tall fern trees on the path that looked like God had made a huge beach umbrella. The fern fronds are huge, maybe 5 feet long.  This is the plant that gives New Zealand its fern leaf symbol. The new fronds are grown long with the leaves tightly curled until it fully extends and unfurls.

The river was rocky and beautiful as it twisted through the canyon.  We could feel the bridge sway as we crossed .   This river as used in the filming of the Hobbit.

 This region is also heavily involved in timber.  We saw a lot of hillsides where the densely planted pine trees had been harvested and then later a huge ocean depot for huge piles of logs ready to be cut into lumber.





We saw another deer ranch along the way, at the foot of the snow topped mountains.

There was a beautiful  eight point buck in the field.  These deer seem to be furrier than the ones who live near our back yard.  We haven't had any venison yet. 

Rookery

We saw huge rocks in the surf that were bird rookeries.  This one looked like a floating bird itself.  We were also suprised to see more of these tall, royal looking nikau palm trees along the waterfront

 

The area around Nelson is known for its grape production so we saw fields and fields of staked grape vines just starting to bud out green.