Mangapurua history - next year?

Ruapehu Bulletin, Volume 10, Issue 446, 28 July 1992, Page 4

Mangapurua history - next year?

Mangapurua Road campaigner Tom Mowatt predicts the future: • "One day, late in 1993; Many months after DoC had finally retracted and Ihe legality of the Mangapurua Pub-

lic Road was re-estab-lished something happened which sealed the peace in the valley for

eyer and a day. "To give DoC its due, for they were the instigators, a scheme

evolved which was called 'The Great Department of Conservation User Pays Galoshes Scheme'. A nice little kiosk was set up just above the Mangapurua landing, Whanganui

River. "Now, DoC was a bit stiff in the finish, because by the time they got the scheme up and running the public of New Zealand had had a guts full of being told: 'DoC says this', or 'This is incompatible with DoC's plan', or 'This is absolutely integral to DoC's plan', and the old public gave every manjack of DOC staff a tube of cyanide each, despatched them to every corner of the subtropical bushland of the Park and said 'Don't come back till you've got the last bloody possum'. "Nothing more was ever heard of them. If any did retum they never attempted to illegally or otherwise close another public road again - not down our way anyway, in the Waimarino Block, in the great southern area of the Rohe Potae. "But getting back to the scheme, Task Force Green was called in to run the show, the force comprising, naturally all the unemployed from Pipiriki. They did a grand job selling or hiring galoshes to 'extreme green' trampers, who couldn't stand dirt on their tramping boots on the 20-odd mile walk out to either Ruatiti of Whakahora. "With DoC banished, in addition to the Great Galoshes scheme the Government gave Task Force Green a few bob to take over DoC's ro le on the river. This fitted in well with the kiosk, and they studiously kept an eye out for a capsized canoe, a stray kokaka or two (none been sighted in living memory) tidied up Inky Morgan's old colonial house in Mangapurua and otherwise went pig hunting. "They didn't do that well out of the galoshes scheme in the finish as the hunters and their horses (doing the conservancy work) didn't want galoshes and neither did the bulk of the trampers - they just liked the outdoor experience -

a bit of mud on their boots, a horse here and there, a possum or two billion - the valley and the road in short, as it simply was. "Extreme Greens of course having heaps of galoshes on hand never ever impinged again on the very valid rights of the recreational riders and hunters. The riders would carry the Greenies' swags for them and everybody lived happily ever after." Pauline Mowatt Tom Mowatt (of Mowatt Bros, Mangapurua Valley 1916-1938