Wairakei-Napier

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 356, 18 October 1932, Page 8

Wairakei--Napier

The W airakei-Napier Road is an important link in the main highway between Rotorua, Palmerston, and Wellington. It can be safely negotiated in all weathers, and is now the favourite route for motorists journey ing north or south. Leaving Wairakei the road passes through Taupo and along the shores of the lake until it begins the climb toward Opipi, 2,000 feet above sea level. By degrees the car passes out of the region of thermal activity, though as a reminder an occasional hot spring is to be seen. Immense boulders and pumice rocks lie strewn about the country, bearing^ eloquent tpstimony to the mighty volcanic upheavals of past ages. The journey is enlivened by two great ascents • i to the top of Taurangakuma, then down into the valley of the Mohaka River, and up again to the Titiokura Saddle, 1,200 feet above_ the Mohaka. Prom these high altitudes uninterrupted views of xugged and magnificent country are to be had, the perspective on all sides fading into the far distance. The final descent brings the traveller into the rich sheep country of Hawke's Bay. Handsome and spacious homesteads, embodying modern ideas of comfort and luxury, furnish evidence of the great wealth of the. district. A run of several miles along the sea coast leads into the progressive and picturesque t.nwn of Napier.