Life on the Milford Track

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32554, 13 March 1971, Page 10

Life on the Milford Track

Milford Trails. By W. Anderson. Reed. Illustrated. Index. 178 pp. When summing up his 11 years as track foreman on the Milford Track, William Anderson said, “My years no doubt warranted superannuation but I didn’t feel them weighing on me. The track is a healthy place, and, while I lost weight during the season, the strenuous life builds up strength and energy. Good meals, regular hours, the best exercise in the world, walking, perfectly pure water from the mountain streams to replace the loss by profuse sweating; these promote health and kept me young.” But he found it hard to retire. Although Mr Anderson had been replaced as track foreman, owing to his advancing years, by another man, the attraction of the free life was too great, and from 1961 until 1966, Mr Anderson returned each season to the track as a guide. “Milford Trails” presents a detailed study of the Milford Track —its history, development, and Mr Anderson’s own experiences since he and his wife first went to manage Quinton Huts in 1950. After a brief but interesting description of his early days of farming in Southland, nis marriage, and his decision to accept the job at Quintin, Mr Anderson launches into a detailed history of the Milford area, beginning as far back as Maori legend, and encompassing all the early explorers in the region. When Donald Sutherland, accompanied by John Mackay, discovered the Sutherland Falls, which, at 1904 feet are among the highest in the world, the explorers, "in their pardonable enthusiasm” estimated the height was 4000 perhaps 5000 feet. With the discovery of the MacKinnon Pass by Quintin MacKinnon, the Milford Track began to take shape. But its development was not without unfortunate incidents. There was the prisoners* squalid camp at Sandfly Point, where the men were employed to build a road that was never finished, and the tragic drowning of MacKinnon, whose body was never

found. In the first five years of the twentieth century, the provisioning and staffing of the huts along the track was put into operation, and the track was then “something of a cake-walk” in comparison with its condition when it was first used. Later, the Homer Tunnel was put through to Milford, which did much to heighten the tourist attraction of Milford and its track. So that an excellent full-length view of the Sutherland Falls could be obtained, Mr Anderson blazed his wellknown track that is so widely used by trampers today. The death of his wife in 1954, although a great loss to the author, did not deter him from entering into politics, for in the elections that year he represented Social Credit in the polls. The year 1955 saw the addition of a piano at Quintin. The piano, weighing about half-a-ton, was pushed along the track all the way from the Milford end—an extraordinary feat, as anyone who is familiar with the track will know. Much of the book is spent describing the various building and maintenance work that Mr Anderson and the other track hands attended to. After each winter season there were always plenty of repairs to be made, for the torrential rain in the area caused slips to bury the track, trees to fall across it and bridges to be swept away in the ensuing floods. With an unusual colloquial style, Mr Anderson avoids the contrived style that is so much in vogue today, and he remains refreshingly natural and unspoiled. In his last chapter, the author says, "To see the Track is one thing, to know it another. If I were to catechise a tramper I would say: You have seen the Clinton River quietly, peacefully, soothingly flowing round each graceful bend, green forest above matched by the greenness of its tinted waters and mottled bed, but have you seen it on a sunny day, the mists rising from its waters, coloured in all the tints and shades from lighter to deeper blue, emerald green and violet? Have you seen the mountainsides in the Clinton Canyon streaming with a thousand waterfalls? Have you seen the afterglow of the setting sun cast a mantle of rose-red over the Lady of the Snows?” Mr Anderson exhibits a profound perception of his subject Throughout the book the reader cannot help but be impressed by the author’s intense knowledge and appreciation of the wild and beautiful area that he chose to make his home for so many years. “We New Zealanders may justly take pride in our Milford Track, but what is of greater importance to our overseas visitors is the kind of treatment that goes with it If the quality of our hospitality never falls below that of our scenery then we shall always retain The Finest Walk in the World’.”