JOURNAL

Maori Messenger : Te Karere Maori, Volume 4, Issue 61, 24 April 1851, Page 2

JOURNAL

Of an Expedition Ocerland from Auckland to Taranaki, by way of Rotorua, Taupo, and the West Coast, undertaken, in the Summer of 1849—50, by) His Excellency the Gover-nor-iK-CiiiKi- of New Zealand. [Continued from our last ] Sunday, December 30. Walked over to T'iripai after breakfast to attend Divine Service, after which we returned to the camp, and ihen proceeded along the S. B. shore to examine the boiling springs which lie between Te Tarata and a promontory, beyond which is a very extensive swamp ; the first spring after passing Te Tarata, is ca'lcd Whakatorino, and is an immense cauldron of muddy water boiling furiously : we afterwards passed a great number of springs, al boiling, some containing clear water, and others throwing up, not water, but tUck white mud, the largest of these next to Whakatoiino are called Ngahapu and Taka-j pou. We then arrived at a long narrow valley! called Roto Kanapanapa, the entrance to which) is completely hidden by rank Manuka trees! and which one might pass a hundred times with-1 out seeing it, as the track runs amongst innumer-J able puias across the moiijh of this valley and| between""the AlanTiTcaHtrees and margin oF""the ' lake. The valley al its mouth is abmit one hundred and fifty yards wide,and in length is about a quarter of a mile, growing gradually narrower as you proceed onwards. The hills on each side, which are almost entirely bare of vegetation, are composed of a pinkish white clay and abounding in small boiling springs j the bottom of the valley is quite flat and bare, and composed of white pipe-clay with here and there a small puia, all of which emit boiling mud. At the head of Halo Kanapanapa is a small pond of cold gtcen water; at the first sight it appears as if this colour resulted from the fact of the waters being stagnant, but such seems not to be the case, as on pouring it into a phial it is said still to retain its greenish hue, it is not at all disagreeable to the taste. Having examined the valley, we continued our walk along the shore of the lake towards the native huts, and shortly after leaving Roto Kanapanapa we had to ascend a short but steep hill, where we passed a large and very deep well of boiling water, differing from that in most of the other puias in being perfectly clear ; this puia is called Kiwi, and in it two children met a tragical death only a short time ago ; the elder was about seven years old, was carrying the other (.in infant in arms) on its hack, and stooping down to pull up a basket of food which was cooking in the boiling water, the infant, making some movement, lost its hold and fell into the puia j the other child in trying to pull it out, lost its balance and also fell in head foremoht, when of course both immediately perished : the spring has been tapu ever since. A little beyond this is the settlement, called On liana, consisting of a few wretched huts; the most remarkable thing about it being the kilns for drying tawa berries already described. At almobt every step one passes a boiling spring, all of which are more or less curious and interesting, as nearly every one possesses some peculiar characteristic distinguishing it from the others close by j for instance, one may see a puia of black boiling mud, one of while mud, and one of perfectly clear water, with the distance of perhaps a yard between each. We noticed four remarkable Ngawahas here, three of which were on the side of the hill al the back of the huts. The largest of these is called Te Korokoio ote Tupua. It is deep and very narrow; and, in fact, much resembles a thioat in appearance : it seems as if it were nearly extinct. The next in size is called Whata Polio, boiling furiously, not very large but deep, the water perfectly clear; and close beside him is his wife, who does not rejoice in a distinguishing appellative—a small mud volcano rapidly becoming extinct. The fourth ngawha is situated on a promontory which juts out into the lake in front of the settlement, and opposite to the two little islands. On this point are tome pohutukawa trees, under the shade of which is a large ngawha, called Taitaia. Te lieu Hen and his family had taken up their abode on one of the islands, and, seeing our party, they sent off a small canoe for lis, and we paid a short visit to the

: old chief and his wives, with whom were stay- | ing some visitors from Piripai. After leaving our friends wc returned to | camp to dinner, and after dinner proceeded to i examine Te Wakatarata, a puia with baths in l terraces formed in the same maimer as Te , Tarnta, a description of which I have already attempted to give. Whaka tnrala is situated on the northern shore of the lake, and to reach it wc were obliged to cross a portion of the ' waters in a wretchedly small canoe; so small indeed that wc were in great danger every i moment of being capsized into the water, which is warm in all places, but in some parts boiling, or at least too hot to put one's hand into, so that if a person were upset in the middle of the lake, it would be impossible for him to reach the shore in any part without passing over several boiling springs, which must infallibly severely scald him, if they did not cause his destruction at once. We reached our destination, however, in safety, having passed over several boiling springs, the fixed air from which was rising to the surface in small bubbles, like the effervescence of a bottle of soda water. The spring we now visited is still more wonderful and beautiful than the former, the terraces and baths being formed by the deposit from the waters in exactly the same way, but instead of the incrustation being entirely white, as at Te Tarnta, it is at the bottom while as marble, a liitle higher up it becomes pinkish, then of a beautiful salmoncolour, which deepens to a roseate hue as the spectator casts his eye upwards from terrace to terrace ; near the top it gradually becomes mingled with a yellowish tinge, until at the upper range of all, the rock is of a delicate primrose colour. Another difference between this and the oilier puia is, that instead of the water being, as in Te Tnrata, seini-opnque, it is perfectly transparent. In the baths on the terraces it is of ; £, light sky-blue colour, but in the upper receptacle i(which contains the boiling water, and which is quite circular and very large) may be sceii every shade from a lij»ht cerulean tint, in the'shallow water at the edges, to a strong cobalt, where it becomes deep in the centie of the cauldron. Having examined ami sketched this superb sight, and parboiled ourselves in the baths, we returned to camp in Our frail barque, partook of an evening meal, retired for the night, to be again annoyed by the screeching of our aboriginal friends holding their nocturnal orgies in the baths close to us. Monday, Debember 31. Hose at half-past four and having packed up our traps and made all preparations, ue sent on the baggage to one of the Islands by two small canoes while wc walked round to the settlement opposite the two Islands. This operation delayed us a long time, and it was nearly seven o'clock before we had every thing transported across to the S. W. side of the lake at the commencement of the road to Taupo. At last, however, after all the noise, bawling and fuss, which is inseparable from such occasions, we made a fair start at a little after seven. Immediately after leaving the lake we encountered a very sieep ascent of probably nearly five hundred feet, almost perpendicular. However, with much groaning and loss of wind and temper, we contrived at last to reach the top, from which we obtained a very good birds-eye-view of the lake; with the hills of Tarawera beyond, we then entered on a wide' and grassy plain quite destitute of trees and very level. The soil of this plain is poor and contains great quantities of pumicestone, and the grass though growing in great quantities is for the most part of a coarse description, still it is mingled with several kinds .of superior grassess which would afford subsistence to a considerable number of cattle or sheep. It might, however, he easily sown with English grasses (after burning off the native herbage and scarifying the surface of the soil) which there appears no reason to doubt would succeed very well and would, when once they took root, render this plain invaluable for cattle stations as it is well watered by numerous streams which intersect it in every direction, arid in the vallies may be found abundant shelter for the cattle in cold or bad weather, amongst the Manuka and other shrubs. We halted for breakfast at nine, and at eleven were again en-route. We soon came i to a creek called Maujaharakeke which crosses '. the plain and runs westward till it reaches the I Ilorotiti or upper Waikalo lliver. A short distance beyond this there is a huge block of a dp on "end 'VfiVe side of the road as a sort of boundary mark or distance post, this stone is called Wataknpakapa. The Governor cut his initials roughly with the point of his walking-stick in the soft surface of the storre—which act, the unlives told us, would be sure to bring on rain, which actually.did occur shortly afterwards. Haifa mile further on wc encountered a most formidable swamp about two hundred yards across, called Tokiamanga, a little beyond which the road leading to \\ akatanc branches off to the eastward. The next creek we passed was called Torepatutahi, which we crossed on a stick. Close to the place where the stick is laid across, there is a small bay, in which is an eddy o(. the creek, and there the surface is covered so closely witli foaling pieces of pumice-stone ,

that the water cannot de «eeii. This was the occasion of my getting (lucked, as imagining that it was a surt of beach of pumice-stone, I put my foot in it, anil not my foot only hut the whole body, as of course I lost iny balance and fell in head foremost At time o'clock wc atiive-l at a small river called Waiolapu, where we intended lo hall for dinner, and proceed on a little furlhei lo a belter encamping place afterwards Our natives however, much lo our disgust, did not come up until live, and almost al the same time it came on lo rain very heavily, which compelled us to remain here for the night, which we had the less hesitation in doing as there was a good shed lo shelter our natives. We had the mountain called lanwhara, which lies close to the lake of Taupo. in sight in the distance all day.