A VISITOR FROM SYDNEY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 55, 28 November 1907, Page 9

A VISITOR FROM SYDNEY.

ADVENTURES IN THE SCENIC SOUTH AN EVENTFUL TRIP. (by TELIGEAm—SrZCIAL CORRESPONDENT.) Christchurch, Novembor 27. Mr.' James Edmonds, editor of the Sydney who returned from the south 01 Saturday last, had a moving story to confidi to a ''Press" reporter touching his adven tures in the scenic south. Tho usual pre iiminaries stumbled through in tin usual, manner. "Would Mr. Edmonds care ti "say a' piece?" Yes, he would say anything true ,or. : untrue, so long as it was. regardec as .' interesting. He said ho had como ovpi here for a rest, but, to tell the truth, h< romarked, "I have been working hardei than if I had been in Sydney. I set oul for Manapouri and Milford Sounds, neitbei of whioh I had seen befOro. At Manapouri I met my first sandfly. Your sandfly beats tho Australian mosquito hollow; even the Queerisland 'mosquito. You have heard ol him? How;a swarm of them killed and ate a herd of cattle,' and how in the morning a solitary, mosquito was discovered sitting oil the top. rail of the fence picking his teeth with the last bullock's horns. SANDFLIES. "Well, your sandflies can do better ever than - that. They ate a couple of artists the day before I got to, Manapouri, at least sc I deduced. I was.to M.that the artists had gone up the lake in avbjjat on a sketching expedition, and, were going to camp next day. I hired a launch to go up,'because I thought I would like to fraternise witli thorn. I found the camp, with cooking utonBils, etc:,' all in place,' and marks ni the Band -where the artists had .Jteen. ..Then . 3 saw a sandfly hovering ' about • with a hat and a pair- ■ of; boots on. Ano.ther with a : half-finished painting under his arm, so 1./ concluded the sandflies had oaten the artists, boots and all. When I got to Te-Anati,'l was the first tourist;of the season on the track. The Department sends guides'j a telephone lineman, road repairers, and married couples to their posts lon November 1, and turns the gentle tourist looso_ upon the scenery, at tho same time. The* Government assumes that the track- will be in the same condition at the beginning of one soapon as it v.'as at the end of the one preceding. The chief guide bad been over the. track the. previous day, arid; by dint of hard toil, had managod to got the first ten miles of the thirty-three passably clear. Six/small bridges were down, and -I counted twenty-nine places between Te, Anau. and Milford .where .tho telephone wire ha;d been carried away. In two places it. was buried for half a mile by slips. 11l the pass iitself, at an altitude, of 3500 feet, we had to wade thMugh two miles of -snow 'at an angle of fifty.-degrees; . We found that onei,hut was.sadly 'damaged by an avalanche, only the fireplace and about two sqiiare'yards of roof being left. At this point, tourists are supposed to take the boat on Lake Ada, and so save a power of walking. The boat had been bleaching on'the beach all the winter, and so we bad. to tack some sheets of iron from the* niined;hut on to the worst of the leaks to get aloiig at all. Two mon pulled, two others-baled, ono kept a lookout for snags, wliile 1 sat in the stern and lent moral support. Down the lake wo came to tho township of Sandfly, consisting of one consecutive hut',' in which the road-repairers keep their'.stofes.' We tried to telephono to Sutherlands to 6end a boat,- but the wire was down, so we fired off a charge of dynamite. Sutherland heard the explosion and came across' for us. \ ' MILFORD, SOUND. " Of . Milford Sound all 1 can say is that everything is 6300 ft.. high .excepting Sutherland, who is only 6ft. 3in. high. On tlio track. going over two roaumcn sot out to carry out repairs. .The boss was an old man who broke down from fatigue after going ten miles. I left the other. (Charlio, a Victe>rian) trying to repair tho 'thirty-three miles single handed, vancl Charlio. "seemed to be having a bad time. One electrician was sent out, and lie' was repairing twenty-nino breaks, including a couple two miles long, so I left him also having a bad time. The head guide would not lot the bettor-half of a married souple go over to take charge of the beech huts as he aid not want her death on his hands, so the beech huts had to be run on bachclor principles until the snow cleared. Smith, the chief guide, was worried with a mass of departmental details, included in which no had to get each man on,.the road to fill in a form each day stating what work he had done. Smith complained that the men were spread over thirty-three miles of road, and he didn't quite see how :he could get it all done. , THE BOAT SANK. " The inspector roads tried to crd3s back to Sutherlands. The : boat sank three times, under him, and finally lie swam back ashore, .towing it with him. Finally, ho tried to stop the leaks with grass and fern, arid got to Sutherlands in the evening, tie wanted to know if.lie had to fill in his little form stating that he had spent the clay sinking and swimming. On two occasions f .would have died on tho track if, it had not been for guides Smith 'and Napier. Where the Tray was badly blocked with, snow we had to climb over the hill to get round. I slipped and just managed to grab a tuft of grass. Of course, I couldn't haug on indefinitely, and tboro was a fall of 800 ft. below. Smith hung' on to tho collar of my coat and Napier nxcd'up a rope of flax. Between the two of thenil got up. Comin" back, Smith helped me down with another flax rope, arid as 1 am no mountaineer, but for them I" would" have come to"a short sudden end, and realised on my 'insurance policy.. But tho scenery was worth .it all, even under thoso distressing circumstances. I ani- going to recommend all my friends to go during December, January, or February, and all my enemies to .go early in November—the earlier the better.:. Milford was tho most beautiful spot I have seen, and I felt I must make an mtry in Sutherland's visiting-book of ' Nothing at all like this in George Street, Dunedm. '