WOMEN ALONG THE ROAD-IV Haast Settlers, Content To Stay, Ready For Tourists

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30887, 21 October 1965, Page 2

WOMEN ALONG THE ROAD-IV Haast Settlers, Content To Stay, Ready For Tourists

(By TUI THOM AS, women s editor of "The Press”) If a proposal eventuates to move the Haast township to Greenstone, seven miles away’ on the highway to Wanaka, Haast’s total population of about 130 people will be reduced to a mere scattering of settlers’ families. Living on the verdant land their forbears hewed from the bush, they are content to stay where they are.

‘Tve been a ‘bush rat’ too long to want to live anywhere else,” one of them told me. But the settlers have no intention of shutting themselves off in an exclusive little clan when their neighbours leave.

The tourists who go through Haast and Okuru along the winding bush road to see Jackson’s Bay, will be welcome to make a stop-over. Traditional West Coast hospitality reaches its peak of generosity in the south. Two of the oldest families have already provided for travellers on their properties at Okuru, seven miles south of Haast township. The R. P. Nolans have converted a house on their property into two family motels to accommodate 11 visitors.

The Charles Eggelings can find beds for about 30 in the cabins they have built on their camping ground.

Easier Access

The new road link from Paringa to Haast, to be opened on November 6, will bring improved amenities to the district as well as more tourists. It will open up an easier access to markets for the farmers and speed up surface mail and freight services. “It will mean we can have Sunday Mass more often,” said Mrs Kevin Nolan. “At present we only have it on Sundays four or five times a year and mid-week Mass every six or seven weeks.” But the new highway to northern towns could have its disadvantages. “We have been a very happy, self-contained and united community, making our own fun,” she said. “Now people will want to gb to Hokitika and Greymouth more often for their entertainment.”

Mrs Nolan, the former Miss Pat Sullivan, of Fox Glacier, has eight children, a large family home, a drapers shop at Haast and another at Carter’s Mill. She lives about half-way between the two.

“I am actually looking for-

ward to the time when the road opens up the district and more people come round,” said Mr Eggeling, who has lived in the lonely district for nearly 40 years. She is married to a beef cattle farmer whose family were original settlers. Tourists, however, may not find it easy to catch a glimpse of Betty Eggeling. She is a woman “a-go-go.” Rising soon after 6 a.m., she milks up to 12 cows a day, delivers the milk every morning to families at Carter’s timber mill. She is a commercial whitebaiter, has five children (the youngest is still at school) and breeds her own riding horses. Any time after 10 p.m. she may still be working—on books for the camping ground or checking stocks for the campers’ store. Search For Gold “I like to get away from it all sometimes, then I go riding,” she said. “Or maybe fossicking for gold in the

black sands over there. I have often found colours, but never my fortune.” Mrs Eggeling also qualifies for the American title of “stonehound.” “I have found some beautiful stones in this area. 1 intend to make a fireplace with them in the community hall at the camping grounds. I never have a dull moment. It’s a full life for me and that is the way I like it,” Betty Eggeling said. Cattle Rancher

Mrs Harold Pratt of Haast is one of New Zealand’s few women cattle ranchers.

As Myrtle Cron, she was born into a family of early settlers and has lived there always. She now manages the Cron estate. “It’s work I have liked from childhood and I’ve never wanted to do anything else,” she said. It Is daylight to dusk work, mustering beef cattle on the Haast river flats.

Before the Haast-Otago road

was opened in 1960, Mrs Pratt would often spend 10 days in the saddle, with two days off to rest her animals, when droving cattle 122 miles to market.

Mrs Pratt's husband has a service station on the property, where the highway from Paringa swings on to Otago. “He is pretty good at fending for himself when I'm away with the cattle,” she said. On the Cron estate also Is the Haast aerodrome. In the one-room "air centre” Mrs Pratt checks tickets, passengers’ weights and their baggage before they board the seven-seater aircraft for Hokitika. Heavier traffic and more travellers, expected when the new road is ready, will not disturb Mrs Pratt’s way of life. She welcomes it as progress.

“The new link-up will bring many advantages to the more remote settlers. They will now get better services from the outside world. That is what matters,” said Mrs Pratt