Zealandia is truly a special place. So much so that we had to visit it twice – a twilight tour yesterday, and then again during the day today. The sun was just setting behind the western hills as we started our twilight tour yesterday.

Zealandia is in a valley, with very steep hills on either side. So, even though the sun had set for us, down at the bottom of the valley, the eastern side of the valley was bathed in golden light. Special!

Zealandia a nature preserve only a kilometer from the center of the city. It was the first urban nature preserve in the world, and it has proven to be immensely popular … even though there were doubters when it was initially proposed in the 90’s. Apparently some people thought a mountain bike trail would be a much better use for the decommissioned water reservoir. Fortunately, reason prevailed, and today Zealandia offers a unique experience for New Zealand natives and for visitors from around the globe.

The original proposal for Zealandia faced two major challenges. The first was eliminating all the invasive species from the preserve – think pigs, rats, mice, possums, rabbits, and stoats to name a few. Once all the predators were gone, the even bigger challenge was keeping them out. This had never been done before, so they had to develop their own system. They designed, and built, a fence that was too high for anything to jump over, had a “cap” to keep anything from climbing over, and a buried “skirt” to keep pests from digging under. The concept was tested, refined, and tested again until it did its job. It looks like this.

After an explanation of the work that went into designing, building, and maintaining the fence, we started the tour. I don’t have a lot of pictures … it was getting dark, and I wanted to be in the moment, and commune with nature. But I did get a few that I wanted to share. The first is the Kereru, or Wood Pigeon.

One of the fascinating things we saw were the Tuataras. They were outside their dens, absorbing the last of the days heat, so I was able to take many excellent pictures. I’ll only bore you with one…

The Tuatara looks like a lizard, but it isn’t. It is a reptile, but not a lizard. In fact, it is closer to dinosaurs and to birds than it is to true lizards. Here is a brief description, for those who like those things.

I also managed to get a reasonably good picture of Titipounamu, known as Rifleman in English. They are feeding on the flowers in the trees, still illuminated by the setting sun.

That’s all the pictures that I took on the twilight tour … it was getting dark. But I’ll tell you what we saw. There were several tui, and many kakas enjoying the feeders provided for them. They like to fly low over people, barely missing their heads … and scaring the daylights out of me. But best of all, we saw two kiwi, feeding in the bush. Apparently fewer than 3% of native New Zealanders have ever seen a kiwi in the wild, so we felt that we were very lucky.

We had such a good time yesterday that we returned today for a daylight visit. The twilight ticket allows you to visit during the day as well, so we gladly accepted. I’ll open with a picture of New Zealand’s iconic silver ferns.

We also saw California quails, with baby chicks. These aren’t native, but they fill the same ecological niche as a New Zealand quail that has gone extinct, so they are welcomed in Zealandia.

We saw chicks when we were here last year as well. They are so cute!

It wasn’t all that crowded, so most of the time we had the paths to ourselves, and enjoyed “forest bathing”. We love that. There are a number of small streams running through Zealandia, so you can usually hear the sound of running water, which is also very soothing.

In the damp areas there were mats of liverwort, a very primitive plant, from the time when plants were moving from the sea to the land.

Everywhere you walk you see climbing vines, but these vines don’t harm the trees they climb on, unlike ivy. They don’t produce leaves, until they get to the top of the canopy, at which point they produce leaves and flowers. This next picture shows the vines twining together to climb higher.

There is also a suspension bridge in Zealandia. Not as high, narrow, or long as the Capilano Suspension Bridge near Vancouver, but it still bounces a bit as you walk across it. Definitely worth a visit.

It was too dark last night to get good pictures of the Kaka, stepping on the feeders to open the top and get a treat. There weren’t as many of them today, but I did manage to get a good picture of one of them. They are very smart, opening the feeder to get a nut. The feeders are here to encourage the Kakas to nest in Zealandia where it is safe, rather than outside the fence where there are still predators.

Then it was time to catch the shuttle back to the Botanic Gardens, and take the cable car down the hill into town.

We will be going to Damascus for dinner tonight, a lovely middle eastern restaurant the kids introduced us to last year. But until it’s time to go, I’m writing this blog and sampling a lovely fresh IPA from Garage Project. The “Jan” just means it was brewed in January this year, so it is very fresh. But Jan claims that the “Jan” refers to her. Whatever … it’s very tasty.