SOME BY-PATHS.

Press, Volume LXII, Issue 18626, 26 February 1926, Page 6

SOME BY-PATHS.

WEST COAST CYCLING-TRIP,

LITTLE KNOWN BEAUTIES. (By D. A. CARS.) This is intended as a description, in some sort,, of a trip by four students along the coast from Greymouth to Westport, then to Reefton, and back again to their starting point. Part of the ground covered in their journey is already well known. Punakaiki must by now be known, by name at least, all over New Zealand, while the Buller Gorge i 3 famed even beyond these Islands. But probably few know that there is scenery along the West Coast even finer than that already known, and it is with this part that this' article intends mainly to concern itself. It is with diffidence that I attempt to describe the utterly indescribable, and with a certain reluctance that I write anything which might help to expose a iitte known route to the devastation that follows in the wake -of the touring sightseer. We left Greymouth on Monday of the second week in February, with packs on our backs and" ground sheets and blankets strapped to our bicycles. Be it said here that though we took bicycles to economise time, the better way by far is to walk the sixty miles from Greymouth to Westport—to have time "to stand and stare," and be able to devote one's whole attention to the scenery instead of the irregularities of the road.

"Finest Motor Drive in the World." As far as the Pororari river, and about a mile and a half beyond, there is a tolerable n\otor road. From this point there is a pack track for six or seven miles, until the road is again reached beyond Brighton. The Government is'proceeding slowly with the task of converting the track into a road, which will one day bo one of the finest motor drivii.in the world. The road between Thames and Coromandel does not stand comparison with it. Even the Buller Gorge could not be compared for variety and grandeur with this road along the coast. A pleasant ride in the afternoon sun on Monday, carried us out of Greymouth, through Runanga, to the Seven Mile creek, i'roiii this point the ' road winds up around a hill, having below the sea, and a great height of hill above. It is a magnificent stretch, with the blue of the sea, and the brown and green of the bush contrasted, and the ceaseless breaking of the ocean on the rocks below the road. Barry town received us next —a little vagrant town with a new hotel in painted cleanliness amid the general dilapidation. The name, "All Nations Hotel," set us wondering whether it referred to some polvglot settlement of the past. Wc arrived at Punakaiki at about five o'clock, and camped on the extreme, end of the beach beyond the Pororari river. The beach lay below gigantic cliffs, four hundred feet of perpendicular rock looking out on the Western ocean. We slept in the open beside a fire of driftwood, which lies in abundance on all the beaches. I had one regret that night, that I had not Rupert Brook's poem on Tahiti Beach" beside me. The country has a sub-tropical luxuriance of vegetation, the warm air, and the appearance of a South Pacific island. The nikau palms which grow everywhere, help the illusion of some island paradise.

By the Camp Tire. 1 lay awake beside the fire that ui"bt 'watching the windless heights, where the Southern Gross hung over the top of a hill, and Orion swung, slowly westering. One red star m particular attracted my attention as it peered through a gap in the bush on the top of a bluff beside us, crossed it and disappeared. In our civilised se'ciiritv-we miss this nightly companionship of the heavens. To be listento the regular roar of breakers on the beach bevond is an unforgettable experience—to music that has known no intermission since the beginning or terrestrial time. The next dav we were awake early, repelling legions of sandflies, which came in" mvriads with the dawn. The river's inviting appearance, as it flowed along the lieacli parallel to the sea, templed us to a bathe about sis o'clock in the morning in the coldest water r have ever swum in. After breakfast we made our wav back along the beacn in a point where the sea has hollowed the rock to form a blowhole. The rock formation is extraordinary. The pornt consists of a group of pinnacles looking as if some, fantastic prehistoric pastrycook- had piled pancake on pancake, graduallv diminishing in size towards the top'. Tim blowhole itself was in the centre of these pillars and walls. The sea enters a. cave with a narrow aperture at the ton through which the inrushino- waves blew spray to a height of twentv and thirty feet. A smaller bole, which works when the tide is lower sends a stream like a cannon shot ' horizontally back towards the sea. The rest of the point has a weird attraction, but the blowhole its-elf fascinated us lor half a morning.

An Afternoon Walk: in the afternoon of the same day we walked along the road beyond the Pororari river towards Brighton. The road ends in a bridle track on the side of a cliff, a sheer four hundred feet above the sea beach—-one of the most magnificent scenes on the whole route. The' bill rises behind higher still; to north and south aro.immense stretches of rockv benches, while below the great waves-look like mere pencil lines on the surface of the sea. Just beyond this point, the track enters the- bush, still clinging to the side of # tho cliff. On this afternoon the air was tremulous with the chirruping of cicadas. We were glad nest day that we hat! seen this part of the road on foot, as it is the finest of all. .

On our way bark, ivc went downhill off tho road' to Perpendicular Point, .i»st beyond the mouth of tho Pororari. "iVe could have spent a day watching tho wares break on this series of great rocky buttresses. On most beaches the water becomes shallower towards the shore, and the wares break before they veach the rocks. This point, however, frees far out into the deep water. The waves come in slowly, one after one, and hurl themselves against the rock tare. It is a sight never to be forgotten. Looking sideways, we could see the long ranks of waves travel past us into the bay behind, like svinthes of mown grass. There- is another blowhole at this point- which blows up like a geyser to a height

of about forty feet. Unlike the blowhole at the other point, it is not surrounded by rocks, but shoots straight up pillar like. Underground Theatre. We were told of caves also at this point, but as time was short, wc were able to find only one of vast and impressive grandeur: a, semi-circular theatre large enough to shelter hundreds of men. This point, which ia rather off the road is even more strange and beautiful than the better known blowhole of the pancake formation. The next morning, Mr Thompson kindly lent U3 the one boat on the Pororari river, which is navigable for about a mile and a half. It Hows between bush draped cliffs, twining four hundred feet on either hand, throwiug great shoulders against the sky. From the placid depths of the river their height appeared stupendous. For the first hundred feet or so, the banks rise steeply, clothed in dense virgin bush, but above that there i 3 no hold for vegetation on t§~e great walls of rock until at their summits the bush laps over and appears to flow a short distance down the limestone. When we went up, two late rata trees still gave a fiery reflection in the. brown depths of the river. More travelled people than ourselves report that the river rivals the Wanganui in everything but length. We considered it one of the finest sights of the trip. That afternoon —Wednesday—we pushed on towards Brighton, This piece of road —it is only a track at present —will be one day famous, when it becomes the main route from Greymouth to Westport.

More Caves. On Thursday morning we hired a guide who led us two miles up Fox's river to the eaves for which Brighton is famous. The trade through the bush is most strenuous, but the caves are worth the struggle. One which goes seven chains into the hill is said to be nearly as good as Waitomo. It is still marvellously beautiful, though unfortunately, vandals carried off many of the best stalactites before the Government appointed guides. We were told people came up and took them away in sackfuls. Such desecration makes one reluctant to turn the 'attention of tourists to many of our less known beauty spots. We had not time to enter the cave beside, which is a quarter of a mile long, but contains no stalactites. There is a romantic interest al&mt this one time town of Brighton, now consisting of a. single house.' In the days of the gold rush, it held between five and six thousand people. To-day, not a trace remains. Charleston, further along the route, held 30,000, and had ninety hotels. It is now a desolate wreck. On Thursday afternoon we left in rain for Westport. We found the road again, but so bad that the thirty miles to Westport knocked U3 up more than the fifty miles up the Buller to Eecfton. It spoils the pleasure of even the finest scenery to steeplechase over boulders as big a3 one' 3 fist, up and down hill on a wet day. Nevertheless we had glimpses of wonderfully beautiful country. The road,, which commences again soon after Brighton, turns inland slightly to Charleston, that "abomination of desolation," and thence further in still until Westport.

Better than Euller Gorge. I mav mention here what made us rate this fifty miles of track and road above the more famous Buller Gorge. The Gorge seemed by comparison monotonous after the endless variety of country we had been through. The Coast road has the sea, and bush, and cliff, river after river, giving glimpses up mountain gorges: it winds through the bush, makes diversions inland, crawls up grassy hills, and finally trayels across a brown harmony of marshgrass and reed across Addison's flat, where the range of hill 3, that lias followed the coastline so far, recedes inland. This range keeps very close to the shore, usually falling away abruptly from a great height into the sea in bush clad, precipitous slopes. _ The country towards Westport had changed in character entirely from that nearer Greymouth. Unfortunately we saw it too quickly to describe each portion of the route accurately by the light of memory. At Westport nest morning, we were driven out'in p> friend's" tar to Cape Foulwind. This was a delightful- run in the warm, sunny air. - The Needles, a group of ' rocks' oft' the cape, we could have sworn were only half a mile out to sea, but were assured that they . were fully three miles. The illusion is extraordinarilv convincing. Saturday took us up through th© Buller in perfect weather, and by four o'clock we reached Reefton. On Sunday wo intended to reach the Jiew Alexander reef. We rode up the Inangahua Valley, past Crushington, towards the Maruia, through the most beautiful bush road I bad ever seen. This journey is well worth making. However, "after fourteen miles we stopped where the chair crosses the river on a cable and the three mile bush track begins to the mine. We were told that it would take two and three-quarter hours to reach the mine, and as long back, and so decided not to attempt it. .Monday landed us back in Greymouth after a" week's absence. The road from Reefton to Greymouth, is, as everyone knows, a beautiful one, j but it is well known, and needs no advertisement.