THRILLING EXPERIENCE.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 87, 22 April 1901, Page 2

THRILLING EXPERIENCE.

CYCLIST’S ADVENTURE. Hokitika, Friday. • Two gentlemen, Mr Reynolds, of Auric, land, and Mr Clarkson (Lyttelton Times), arrived at Hokitika yesterday evening, after an eventful bicycle journey over the Otira Gorge. They will not be very anxious to undergo a second adventure of the kind. After leaving the Bealey Hotel on Sunday afternoon, in threatening weather, the first mishap was the bursting of both tires of one of the bikes, which caused a delay that cost them the required daylight for getting over the gorge. Darkness overtook them before they reached Creek, which was swollen. It was then so dark that they could not find the road after crossing. The two cyclists recrossed the stream, and took shelter under a rocky bank, the rain coming down in torrents. The darkness was so dense that they could not see each other. Here they remained from seven o’clock until three in the morning, soaked to the skin, and obliged to keep stamping their feet and swinging their arms to retain warmth during the long hours. They heard what sounded like the approach of a benighted fellow-being, and hailed two or three times, but received no response but a melancholy low from a wandering • cow. . About three o’clock, the light of the moon showing very faintly through the thick clouds, they ventured to push ahead, and, with great pluck, entered upon the dangerous feat of walking down the gorge in the thick darkness, cautiously feeling their way by hugging the high bank, though, at the sudden banks, they were uncomfortably near the edge of the precipice. At five o’clock the unhappy travellers reached the Otira Hotel drenched to the skin and tired out. Here they were stormbound for three days, with tlie wind rushing down the gorge with hurricane force, and the swollen streain rushing with deafening noise down the narrow channels.