IN MOUNTAIN RANGES

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21334, 29 November 1934, Page 6 (Supplement)

IN MOUNTAIN RANGES

In '-Tr- ■? Press Junior" of July 12. 19CT. p. tarn was denned as "an alpine lakelet." Many watersheds are too rugged to provide undulating lake hollows but some of the most curious of our lakes and tarns turn up to delight explorers in the unexpected fastnesses. High on the slopes of Mount Oates in the region of Goat Pass there lies an unnamed tarn which is unvisited, although three parties have climbed and traversed the parent mountain. A party inclining towards leisure could spend a most pleasant day climbing to this tarn alone and no doubt the first recorded bathe would be a cold one. Some of the major passes have goodly lakes nestling in the border line between Canterbury and Westland. On March 19, 1865, Edward Dobson recorded of the Walker's Pass that "the top of the pass forms a rough valley covered with loose stones and scrub, and rising to the westward, with a deep pool near the summit." Geological surveyors have described Lake Browning as being " a beautiful sheet of clear

LAKES AND TARNS

(By John Pascoe)

A Tarn on Mount Cheesman's Slopes

water situated on Browning's Pass, at an altitude of 4490 ft with an area of some 38 acres." Frozen in winter, this lake is nevertheless an attraction in summer and I have vivid recollections of a hurried bathe in the icy waters at Easter. The solid warmth of a pemmican stew added to by the mountain sunlight was welcome after such a chill but refreshing encounter with the water of the snows. Ariel's Tarn on the Westland slopes of Harman Pass is a valued land mark to those trampinl? the Three Pass trip in adverse conditions. The lake described by Samuel Butler in "Erewhon" as being on the Whitcombe Pass is imaginary and was probably mentioned to lend colour to the narrative. Tarns are scarce on the piles of shingle which comprise the 6000 ft foothills. A pool on Mount Cheesman in the Craigieburn Range, is illustrated as being an excellent place for fun. The diversion at this particular spot lay in removing the layers of ice so that the tarn could be opened for swimming.