OLD DEVONPORT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 122, 25 May 1932, Page 9

OLD DEVONPORT.

POPULAR HOLIDAY SPOT. THE STRAWBERRY GARDENS. AT, FRESCO PLEASURES. (By OLD TIMER.) Mention of the fact that the Auckland Harbour Board has vested the old signal station site on Mount Victoria, the Devonport Domain Board, reminds one that in the days gone by "the Shore'" was quite a popular place for a day fc outing, and the top of Mount Victoria was one of the viewpoints of the isthmus. In those days —30 or 40 years ago —Aucklanders had not siicli a wide selection of picnicking spots as they have to-day. Young people of the present generation do not realise what a great change the motor car made in the habits of Aucklanders. With a horse and trap one could not, in a day, make a very long excursion into the country, and moreover it was not everyone who owned a vehicle. The usual method of picnicking by land was to club together and hire a brake or wagonette from Pullan and Armitage in Albert Street, Crowtlier's at the corner of Wellesley and Lorne Streets, or Martin's in Parnell, just above the Windsor Castle Hotel. As a trip into the country was thus rather an undertaking, the run across the harbour to Devonport was very popular on holidays. It gave one a blow on the briny, and a chance to see the view from the signal station, and it was cheap. An outing without eating is no outing to the average man and his family, and to cater for the trippers there used to be "The Strawberry Gardens," somewhere on the north-east side of Mount Victoria. In those days ferries used to call at two wharves at Devonport, "Ghost" wharf, opposite the Masonic Hotel, towards the North Head, and the old wharf on the site of the ,present imposing ferro-

Horse Trams to Cheltenham. The walk from either wharf to these strawberry gardens was a pleasant country affair, and for the tired one seems to remember some sort of an ancient shandrydan drawn by lean quadrupeds. Later, of course, there were the. quaint little horse trams that ran from the Victoria wharf to Cheltenham Beach. The beach, however, was a secondary point of attraction in the very early days —the strawberiy wardens were the more popular. Avvaj back in the past Aucklanders did not seem so keen on swimming as the present generation —a fact which probably proves that the race is changing its habits, and that the present-day Aucklanders approximates nearer than his ancestors to the South Sea Islander who spends all his spare time in the water. When the strawberry gardens existed, the luscious berry was not grown in tons, as it is nowadays on the claylands across the water, and a "strawberry tea" was considered quite a. treat by little Aucklanders. The gardens must have been just at the foot of Mount Victoria, if memory be correct, somewhere among the pine trees, for one seems to recall rustic tables made of tea-tree sticks, set about under the j trees. Our ancestors must have been harder than their offspring, for outdoor gardens were a common feature ot Auckland in the long ago. Gardens at Ellerslie. In addition to the popular North Shore rendezvous there were famous wardens at Ellerslie, _ somewhere close to the railway line, just to the north of the present station, where there were arbours, a sort of menagerie, and a pronramme of entertainments. Nowadays people who go holidaying like to be well glassed in, whether in their motor car or in a tearoom. At a latei date than the strawberry gardens at Devonport was the bear garden, on the waterfront, long towards the Calliope Dock, whore there used to be a bear pit, with real live bears —and, of course, refreshments. This used to be an evening as well as a daytime resort, but the rustic strawberry garden, with its picnic tea-tree tables was a day resort. Of course, many more thousands of people visit the Shore to-day, but they make a beeline for the beaches, and the idea of a "day in the country" has gqnite—vanished from-fcheualijig.