Early in October we spent a week or so exploring Old Forest, finding all 9 of the surveyor boundary pegs and walking over as much of the property as possible, also working out where a driveway could be made. Below are the photos we took.

At the top of Mokihinui Preserve Road, the tree ferns are at the start of Old Forest.

The tall trees above our car are on Old Forest.
Looking back down Mokihinui Preserve Road.

The tops of mamaku, also known as black tree fern or king fern.

Some of the big trees

View north from ridge looking out to the Glasgow range.

View looking west from a ridge on Old Forest, Seddonville can only just be seen at bottom left through the leaves. The wee glimpse of blue in the V of the hills is the Tasman Sea.

View of Mokihinui River from the ridge.

Nathan's photos of a weka that came looking to see what insects we were disturbing. He even tried to drag Nathan's day pack away!

Nathan's photos of a beautiful South Island Robin who came to see what we were doing on Old Forest.

Jeff helping Marilyn who has fallen down again.......... it's such a rough piece of land that this happened many times!!

Jeff and Nathan using a GPS to try and find positions on Old Forest, such as the boundary pegs, there are 9 of them. It is difficult to get an accurate GPS reading as the tree cover is so thick. The surveyors plans give very accurate GPS positions though because of the aerial system they use.

Nathan is making a small diversion channel to divert spring water that had been running down our walking track and making it very muddy. He is using old tree fern logs to edge it.

The spring water running well in the diversion channel that Nathan made.

Jeff and Nathan transplanting very young nikau that were growing where the driveway up into Old Forest is planned to go. Not sure if they will survive the transplant but it is worth trying as they would be cleared when the road is formed. If nikau are very small they have a reasonable chance of surviving but once they get bigger than around 18 inches high the root system change and it is almost impossible to successfully move them we have been told.

Murphy Creek which is at the far end of Old Forest... Jeff and Nathan exploring the creek area.

Marilyn at Murphy Creek.

Burke Creek ford which is just past the Mokihinui Preserve. This will remain as a ford. Mokihinui Road becomes very narrow at this point and is really only a 4WD road. It crosses another ford and after that it is just a tramping track up through the Mokihinui Gorge. It's an 8 hour tramp to a hut.

Coal Creek ford on Mokihinui road. A bridge has been built over this ford by the developers and is council owned and maintained. The Mokohinui Preserve is on the other side of Coal Creek from Seddonville.

Below are a few photos taken on Old Forest, Jeff is in one of them, making his way through the dense growth.