A TRIP TO ISLAND BAY.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 1919, 19 February 1885, Page 2

A TRIP TO ISLAND BAY.

Wellington- is a small octopus which stretches out its arms in many directions'. One of its.extremities, reaches • to Island Bay a marine suburb some four miles from the town proper',' Island Bay is as yet known to fame merely by its brand.. new'-?little:,tao'e.:course on which- it-hair been demonstrated that a mile eliptic can be carved out of a fifty-acre flat, but in a not very distant future it will have a wider.reputation as a.sanatorium. The name 'lsland Bay' is well chosen. It embraces the whole panorama. There is a snug little bay and at the mouth of it a snug little -island'.' ;; The latter i 3 uninhabited save by rabbits but it possesses a wealth of shells and sea-weed which attracts numerous visitors and round its rugged shore there is excellent fishing. It it said that one of. Wellingtons- great projectors who is known to fame as "the. Whiffler" has proposed to erect a pleasure palace, by means of a company, on this secluded isle. His design is, was; or will' be to build a big public house, one half of which should be run on the temperance principle and the other section on a whiskey basis. If his idea is carried out the place will havo the option of becoming either a "rightlittle'islarid" or a" "tight little island", probably the latter! As yet, however, the genius.of ( ~ t he\MiiJßer".ha3 not made its mark on Island- Bay. • The' main attraction of this resort at present is a oommodious hotel where visitors can make themselves very comfortable, The rooms are spacious and well-furnished, and a kindlier and more attentive hostess than Mrs Turner iB not to be met with, Host Turner too, is the right man in the right plaoe Introducing visitors to the mysteries of boating and pointing out to them the deep sandy bedß from which the rook cod and other denizens of the deep oan be lured.. There is a good deal of fishing at Island Bay! and sunset tho fishermen who dwell there haul in their nets, and make up those wellknown bundles which now and then find their way to Masterton, The air of Island Bay impregnated by tho breezes of t|ie great ooean is invigorating and appetising. The oldest inhabitant, C. Moody hy name, irifqrmed us, and no one disputes what C. Moody says, that the water there is full-bodied and will pan out any number of ounces of salt to the gallon. C. Moody is the oracle of Island Bay, and the living witness of its health-renewing climate. Some few years ago he was requested to arrange his worldly affairs by the doctors. Instead qf doing this he went to Island Bay, and there he still lives, and defies thj ragdpl profession to kill him, the" Island Bay community is a small one, but on. gala days the place ia populous enough. On fine Sunday and Saturday afternoons 'bus, buggy, and' carriage roll in- quick' succession up to the hotel, and swarms of pa's and ma'B alight with their olive branches spreading along the sands, and by the margin of the bright..sea:waves,--When the little ones take their shoes and sooksoffon the rocks, and patter with their twinkling feet over the sand, and through the water, one realises the benefit of a fine watering place like this in, the immediate neighborhood of a populous city. Island Bay has other attractions including a live hermit. This individual lives in a' rocky cave about half a mile from the hotel, and has been in the hermit business there for Beveral years, and as he finds it profitable will no doubt continue in his romantic abode for as many more, ' We thought, that the laziest man in- creation was to be found amongst tho Maoris, but the hermit of Island Bay can give the natives points and beat them hands down, His cavern is a natural recess about twenty-five feet long and twelve broad. He sits in it attired in a seedy black suit all the year round, just rousing himself occasionally to boil a cup of tea and to eat the food which the gods provide._ Visitors from Wellington by the score invade his den wliich is a musty fusty place, but the musfciness and fusfcinesa does not deter curious man and still more curious woman from interviewing the recluse. The hero of the cavern is a clever well-educated man, but evidently a profoundly lazy scamp. He has fino feelings which increase his popularity and possibly his income. He spurns any direct offer of assistance, but it is said that money unostentatiously left in his cavern by friendly visitors ministers to his necessities, Everybody goes to see him who visits Island Bay. By law the hermit is a rogue and vagabond who ought to get locked up for being without visible means of support, but by a public concensus of. opinion which is stronger than any Act of Parliament, he is an eccentricity which must be preserved in a dirty cave tq satisfy the' Qurjo|t P,f'yjsjtors,