IN THE AIR

Hokitika Guardian, 19 October 1933, Page 6

IN THE AIR

SEEING THE WEST COAST

TOURIST SERVICE SCHEME.

CHRISTCHURCH,. Oct. 19

“If you want to go to Okuru from Hokitika by any other means than by air you may spend four days on the way, but if you travel by air you can do the journey easily in one and threequarter hours. If anyone there fails sick it is a trip of a day and a half on stretcjiers till any faster conveyance can be used—an aeroplane there, and the.'patient :s in hospital in less than two hours,” said Mr J. C. Mercer, when speaking at the Canterbury Automobile Association’s rooms last night in support of a proposal for establishing an aviation company on the West Coast of the South Island by a'r. The company, which is to be known as Tourist Air Travel and Transport Service, will use a Fox Moth cabin aeroplane seating three passengers and carrying their luggage, and will be powered with a Gipsy Major engine. Captain Mercer said that lie had his first flight over South Westland about a year ago and was greatly struck by the scenery and its beauties. Many of his passengers since had asked him if he could take them to these out-of-the-way places—to see from the air the eyer-changing scenery of bush, snow, 'and lake---sights denied to these who could not stall'd the strain and exertion cf- mountaineering.. He said that it Was,; not yet possible to run a service regularly froin Christchurch to the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers, though what he. did consider feasible was a service from Hokitika'to the glaciers, as ; the varying weather condi,tioiis : /6n the two coasts would not affect it. Such a trip would occupy from 35 to 40 minutes actual flying time, . whereas the service car aloiie took six and a. half hours. It would then be possible to' leave Christchurch by the morning train and reach the Fox Glacier the same evening.

Mr' Mercer next discussed the case of those who would thus be enabled to make a week-end trip to the glaciers or spend a week deer-stalking in the wooded slopes, or trout fishing in the innumerable mountain streams which, .unspoilt by frequent visitors, Contained some really big fish.

After: his short address, Mr Mercer showed many interesting slides of the ranges, the West' Coast bush scenery, and the lakes’and mountains of South Westland and Central Otago. Among I those slides, shown were the headwaters of the Waimakariri and Rakaia rivers, ,the;'short, precipitous course of the ! Arawat.q river, two miles' wide'where ■'flow's Into Jackson’s Hay, 20 iriiles from' its source near Mount Aspiring; very clear views of Mounts'Eli de Beaumont, Cook, Tasman, and Aspiring, and as the journey crossed the Divide, the southern lakes, of Wnnaka, Te Anau. and Manapouri. All the views shoivr could he seen in a' round flight jfif five hpßrs,; and a ini Jar iouri(ej t 'b.y ; ;]irfic’. would take the better part of five weeks?

I Mr Hayward, who presided over the j meeting, introduced Mr Mercer as r '“]00-’ per- cent safe pilot,” and- said that, the lecture had brought it very clearly home to him that such a service had to come: ' -