AN HISTORICAL SPOT

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 28, 28 October 1919, Page 6

AN HISTORICAL SPOT

PILOTING IN Till OLDEN DAKS

It is now a far stretch to the days when tho Wellington pilots used to reside at Worser Bay, awaiting the call for their services by the many "limejuicers" on whom the country used to depend for. its overseas supplies before the day of the big ocean-going steamer had arrived, That time was recalled a few days ago. when the little old building which used to stand on the beach side of the road on the northern side of tho bay .was pulled down. This 'was the house where lodged for many years the pilot's crew of four or five men, who at tho call would turn out, night: or day, and man the pilot, boat—a modified sort of whaleboat—and pull out past tho Pinnacles, through the Heads, to the vessel standing off and on, anything from two to seven or eight miles out to sea. Having put tho pilot on board, the boat had then to be pulled back inro Worser Bay, and safely lodged in the boat-house on the beach until the next sailer came along. Though the old crcw-housa lias disappeared after a life of some sixty years, parts of i'lio old IxiaLslied still remain on the beach, where it is now retained as a bathing house for the juniors of the Worser Bay Swimming Club. One of the old pilot crew, who still resides near the spot, is Mr. John Marshall, who, in referring to the buildings that still exist at Worser Bay, stated that the residence of Pilot Holmes still stood sound, and Pilot Shilling's 'house, altered and added to, was still doing good service on the main road in Worser Bay. In explaining lhat the present bonthouse was not wholly the original one, Mr. Marshall said that about 33 years ago the harbour was visited by a tidal wave. Ho was Mien stationed at the outer signal station, from which look-nut they could see the wave approaching like a wall from a long distance out to sea. They watched the approach of the monster wave with tho most intense interest, for at the time the Wakatipu. from Sydney, and the Wakatu, from ICaiknura, were coming in the Heads. The effect of the wave on the larger steamer was to turn her completely round, so that s)ho appeared to be coming in stern first. The wave swamped over the Wakatu. filled her engine; room, and it looked to in at the tinio as though she would go down, but she weathered through after an anxious time It wns that tidal wave which washed right across the road and un to the front door of Pilot Holmes's residence. It completely uudermined the old boatkousp, which collapsed, ami lad be rebuilt. Iu town the wavo nearly lifted some of the smaller vessels on to tho wharf, and did a good deal of damage one way and another. At the time the pilots resided at Worser Bay, a look-out station was kept on the hill in tho reserve at the foot of tho Worser Bay '.Road (near what is known ns the "Green Shed"). From lliere the men could keep a look-out on the flagstaff of the outer signal station, and it was from, there that they invariably received intimation thnt their services were needed. This was done by means of flag signals' by day and a flare at night. For replying to signals there was a flagstaff on the knoll! which had been in a state of decay for some years' past, and which finally collapsed in the gale on Sunday week last. Though it is thirty-one years since Mr. Marshall left the active service of tho Harbour Board, he has, with the exception of some three or four years, lived at the Bay, and In show the stamp of man he is, he sought service on the sea during the war, and wont two trips to England—"doing his bit." He says that life in the old days was very arduous, and the jonrneyings out to the bays werß not quite so easy as they are to-day, as there were no properly-mad." roads, and very frequently the teams taking out provisions and building material would get bogged, and.would have to be dug out of the mud. It was then a case of getting over Crawford'? Hill and the Worser Bay Hill, which modern reading has made unnecessary. The trip was never made without a. spade and tomahawk. Tho former lo dig away the mud and help to form a new track out of a slough, and the lalter to cut down the manuka scrub In lay across the soft places and so prevent, or help lo prevent, a subsidence of the vehicle. Mr. Marshall mentioned, with a twinkle in his eye. thnt he once lost a load of bricks in the mud, so one can gather that mud was plentiful on those earlydav tracks to the bays nlong the western side of the entrance to the harbour. Tho nilot staff used to pet all their wafer from a beautiful spring set low down in the hill right in the middle of Worser Bay.

"The council had a man out here the nUier day ilirininv for water," saiil Mr. Maivhc.il, "when the whole Bay is a mass if springs, and no divining is needed to find (hem. T. know of eighteen springs lv>lv,-(">n lierc (the boatshed on the beach) and the church. That, was why that strip ef land where Mr. Beam I>ni!t hi* cottages was once nothing more than swamp. Then drained it from each end to a Kiimn in the centre, ami so down lo the beach, and that strewn, which is always running across the beach, is flic wafer from the wrings. The stream never fails, winter or se.ninier. but that is not all tho water the springs give, as most <>f it soaks into the sand as soon »? it reaches the bench. The nviin spring in Ihe centre of the B«y was Ihe one the Maoris used to depend upon, and it was considered so essential to the common good that a sixfoot right-of-wav from the road lo the spring was made and preserved in the original deed when (he land was cut up, and it exists to-day."