Otari Wiltons Bush

Otari-Wilton's Bush is a hundred hectares in a Wellington suburb, and it is two things joined: a collection of cultivated native plants - the only botanic garden in New Zealand growing exclusively natives - and, next to it, about eighty hectares of forest that was never cleared, protected from the 1860s by the farmer Job Wilton who fenced it off rather than burn it. That remnant includes an 800-year-old rimu and other trees of a size that simply do not exist elsewhere in the Wellington region. The collections hold threatened species from all over the country, including plants extinct or nearly so in the wild, and are used for conservation work rather than display alone. Tracks range from a canopy walkway and easy loops to a couple of hours in the gully. It is free, on a bus route, and quietly one of the more significant botanical sites in the country.

What you actually see

• The native-only collections - including species near extinction in the wild.
• The old forest remnant - never cleared, with an 800-year-old rimu.
• The canopy walkway - the bridge over the gully.
• The gully tracks - loops from twenty minutes to two hours.

When to go

Any season - it is a forest garden rather than a flowering one. Spring for new growth. Mornings are quiet on weekdays.

Honest expectations

It is not a colourful garden in the European sense; the interest is botanical and the palette is green. Tracks in the gully are steep and muddy after rain. Free, with limited parking.

Nearby

Karori and Zealandia are close; central Wellington is fifteen minutes away.