It was a typical Sunday for us; a sleep in followed by a coffee and the usual morning chores. Being one of the few weekends we had ‘free’, we wondered what we could do to fill in the day.
“We could go for a drive up to that DOC block and have a look?” was my suggestion.
By 10am we had donned the Swannies, packed a day bag with essentials and loaded the dog in the back of the ute. Our mission was simple – make the short trip from our place to one of the local public land areas we'd yet to visit, park at the road end, and simply nosey our way along the ridgeline to recon the area for future visits. As my wife Melissa was seven months pregnant, we were simply thinking a brisk Sunday morning walk to fill in the morning was all we intended to do - so much so that I went out in jeans!
A short time later, we found ourselves parking at the road end, which sat right on the edge (and more importantly, at the top) of the conservation area. A check of the NZ Topo App confirmed that from the moment we started walking, anything we saw was fair game. As itbeing fairly mild, we didn't expect to see much. Of course, I brought the rifle along in case a rogue goat or wallaby appeared. I also decided to pack a roaring horn just in case the odd Red was kicking around still roaring (and to get some practice in).
