West Coast native bush – seriously, is there anything better?! Today we headed out to Goldsborough to do some bush walking in typical West Coast native bush. Goldsborough is about half way between Greymouth and Hokitika but slightly inland, towards Kumara. It is a historic gold mining area.
This is a stunning area and we had a stunning West Coast winter’s day – clear blue sunny skies. Temperatures were a tad cold though, even a frost still on the ground and hugging some of the lower bush line. That’s ok though, we were prepared and we had wrapped up warm with our hiking thermals and had our walking boots to help keep the feet warm – just one thing missing – gloves for our fingers!
The walk we are doing is the Goffs Track/German Gully – starting at the Goldsborough camping ground heading in along the Goldsborough track for about 15 minutes before crossing the river and heading up for a reasonably sharp climb of around 30 minutes. This the Goffs track and it eventually joins Scandinvaian Hill Road. We walk along this for around 15 minutes before coming to the German Gully track – back down hill through the native bush for about 30 minutes, passing water races, sluices and old mining tunnels, before crossing the creek again and finishing back at the camping ground.
The bush is stunning – rimu trees – both adult and baby, matai trees, all variations of ferns – bushes, trees etc. Basically the track is following a ridgeline with steep drop-offs to either side – the track is occasionally rough and slippery so care must be taken.
Once at the top, coming along Scandinvaian Hill Road, the views are fantastic. This is a 4WD road, originally used presumably for logging. It has got quite overgrown since we were last up here but you can still see down the Awatuna Valley and out to the Tasman Sea. Absolutely stunning.
Highly recommend this area for some exploration if you are looking at visiting the West Coast. For now though, http://www.hokitika.org/activities/goldsborough.aspx will give you more information on Goldsborough
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