INTO WESTLAND

Hokitika Guardian, 2 May 1929, Page 7

INTO WESTLAND

(By Elsie K. Morton in the Auckland “Herald.”)

Seeing T had been looking forward for io years to walking into Westland over Arthur's Pass, it did seem hard that the •Sbutlicrn Alps should have chosen that particular week to shake and quake,' and upset tourist itineraries all over the country! One clings stubbornly to long-cherished resolutions, however. 1 bought the stoutest pair of tramping shoes I could find, inarched into the Tourist Bureau in Christchurch, and said I was going over the Pass next day. They were not encouraging. They said (1) I. would almost certainly be struck on the head by a bounding boulder; (2) swept away by a shingle slide if I happened to step on a loose' stone; (3) break a limb in attempting to cross the landslides; (4) fall into a crevasse or down a precipice; (6) that it wasn’t only what happened to foolish people themselves, hut the trouble they gave to other people who had to go out and gather up the pieces. . . .

I bowed my head meekly; there are times when one argues, and there are times when one does not. I had never cherished any idea of going over into Westland save in one piece. . . In chastened tones I asked if they would kindly reserve me a train seat right through to Otira? AT ARTHUR’S PASS. So I came next day • u the be ar ul valley of Arthur’s Pass, lying all ••m----lit and peaceful • beneath /frowning mountain slopes. From the windows of the train we saw uprooted trees pitching headlong down the hillsides, gaping cracks and rents where the road had carried away, and gangs of workmen reballasting the raihvay track. Very lofty and aloof looked the mountain giants keeping guard over the little valley, with white woolly cloud-caps pulled down close over their ears. Very .lonely looked- the heights and distant thin trail of the ruined rend. ... I was glad I

had obeyed the good, old Biblical injunction and been meek, dlse might the angry gods have taken vengeance and never permitted me to claim that heritage of boautv waiting over there in "Westland, tiirice-lovely Westland!

We scrambled for sandwiches and hot tea across the Otira luncheon counter, on. the other sfde of that cold, dark, marvellous‘tunnel through the hills, where the moisture drives like spun rain on your face, and your ears are filled with a montonous roaring, and the great outside world is just a tiny, pin-prick of light in the vast, enveloping blackness. You need the sustaining warmth of hot tea to drive the chill out of your bones, and reinforce you for the fifty-mile motor run to Hokitika. And so I came into Westland that sunny afternoon, handed my baggage checks to an incredibly cheerful, efficient and obliging young man in a smart cap and motor-coat, and took my seat in the Hokitika service car. THROUGH TEREtMAKAU GORGE. . Down through Otira sunlit beeches and forests of lofty rimu and matai, the red and black pine of the South Island, aped the big car, mile after mile, beside the am ben- flecked, swirling waters of the Otira, past the picturesque little Rush Inn accommodation house, and into the rugged hearty of Teremakau Gorge. Hard indeed it was to picture thaf loiHy. lovely road, so desolate and wild as one of New Zetland's great highwa v s of romance, yet the West C; vast Road has seen as brave and glowing a pageant of life as any of that ever led into the El Dorado ol man’s dreams. Down that same road io tlm Golden West, more than half a century ago. marched the great army of adventuring pioneers who sot. tied Westland, and turned its tim villages into crowded, prosperous towns that knew all the swift-passing I glow, the tragedy and romance of | one of the world’s greatest gold rush. I cs. ! Still by the side of the road we saw the ruins of ancient coaching stabW liMlo. old with rusl-rcd roofand quaint, wide chimneys, long sine des’vrted, over Town with we»ds am 1 t.liat curse of Westland, the blackberry. THE GOLDEN PAST. At, last we came out of the region of mountain and bush, and sped down

the open road toward Kumava, passing some of the oldest and most pathetic of all those little deserted mining villages i?f Westland,, Dillmanstown, Goldsborough, Waimea and Stafford . . . what ghosts of the past seemed still to hover about those silent, empty homes, with their lichen-grown wall.', gaping weather-boards, and broken windows! Yet how swift and strong ran the current of life in those once-prosperous mining towns half a ’century ago l What stories of the golden.ipast llie 'buried in Stafford, 'mce a. plane of much importance, with its roomy coaching stables, line •if stores, thirty-seven hotels, post office. Literary Institute and five thousand inhabitants! To-day Stafford is a lonely, deserted, little village with a handful of inhabited cottages, a few families, and a street lined with the empty husks of wooden buildings fast falling into Hie last stages of ruin and decay. And always, everywhere, were the deserted tailings, vast heaps of stones, millions of grey stones piled up into cliffs and ramparts, with weeds, grass, ferns, and plumy toi-toi- taking root in the crevices. . . Nature taking back her own, weaving a new mantle to hide the desolation and scars that man has made in his ruthless quest for gold. A few miles farther on we crossed the Arahura River over a rail and traffic bridge and followed its course down to Hokitika and the open sea.

The sun lay low over the rim of the ocean, bathing land and sea in a golden glow that enwrapped in shimmering glory the distant hills, the dark forests and the long nad by which we hade come. . . Gold. . . .

gold. . . alb the history of Westland is written in gold, gold from Viver-beds and beaches, gold iof ro»manee and high adventure, gold in the brave hearts of the pioneers who followed, the miners, who endured hardships, (loneliness and untold privation in that land of silent, dark forests and snow-clad mountains; carrying aloft the torch that men have fever cjaiTied 'into the wilds, blazing a trail safe and wide for the feet of those who follow after. ...