Thread: Hot weekend mission

This was a bit of last minute trip with my good mate Pete, into some country we've often looked at but never hunted. Left home at 3am Friday morning destined for the lakes region, and by 730am we were waiting for enough light to start glassing.

We spent a couple of days glassing from one area, a fantastic vantage point. However animal numbers were fairly low (we'd spoken to local operators and they were honest in saying they had done a fair bit of waro thru the area since xmas). We only saw a handful of deer spread over a huge area. We also saw a few chamois, including one very nice buck who came out on the first evening about 3km up the valley. Too far for a stalk.

The only maturing stag we saw was a lovely young 8 pointer, who given a few years may be something nice. He came out and found a hind feeding on his patch, it was really interesting watch them interact.

It was bloody hot, so during the day we'd curl up under tussocks and have a good old sleep! (Something I am learning to cherish as a young Dad)

On the last day we bailed off the top of the ridge we'd perched ourselves on and wandered on down the river. It was amazingly good getting into the shade of the beech forest, and we made good time through a couple of rough gorges. Bumped into a couple of deer on the way out which was cool.

We were due to be picked up by helicopter in the main valley about 530, and timed it just right, only having to wait about half an hour before another stunning flight back to our vehicle. Can't beat our back country.

The highlight of the trip for me was seeing my first ever wild NZ Rock wren / tuke - we actually saw four!























Cheers,
JoshC

Dude nice pics!!!!!
Really nice country as well

Epic

Great looking country.

Originally Posted by stug

Great looking country.

Of course it is - it's NZ!

hunting with a camera. Some quite stunning pictures. Quite like the first 2

Mate, these are amazing photos. What camera are you using?

Awesome mate!

Good stuff mate, looks like a good amount of feed about too

Originally Posted by Ryan_Songhurst

Good stuff mate, looks like a good amount of feed about too

HEAPS of feed.

Originally Posted by hotsoup

Mate, these are amazing photos. What camera are you using?

Cheers. Canon SX60hs - weather beaten, drowned and dropped a few times

Originally Posted by JoshC

Cheers. Canon SX60hs - weather beaten, drowned and dropped a few times

Yeah I like my SX60.
Awesome write up as always

Looks like a nice out of the way spot, its shame about the choppers thining the deer in the area.

Nice crystal clear photos, make me want a new camera.

Nice one
Thanks for posting

Nice looking country. I'm coming down that way at Easter. I hope to check some out!