New bar at Mt Cook

Press, 31 October 1977, Page 1

New bar at Mt Cook

. The Tourist Hotel Corporation will provide new restaurant and bar facilities for day trippers to Mount Cook. A tender for the building, which will be alongside the roadway between Glencoe Lodge and the Hermitage, will be let early in the'New Year. The new facilities are among several moves announced by the Minister of Tourism (Mr Lapwood) towards the completion of the T.H.C. development programme at Mount Cook. Speaking at the opening of the new 40-room wing of the Hermitage on Friday (photograph at left) Mr Lapwood said that the corporation’s facilities at Mount Cook had been . a key factor in encouraging overseas visitors to New Zealand. “The T.H.C.’s Mount Cook complex now offers more than 200,000 beds a

year, and if last year’s occupancy rates are maintained, 120,000 of those beds will be occupied by overseas tourists,” he said.

Planning for stage two of Glencoe Lodge was well under way also, and construction would be started by this time next year. Glencoe would then have a further 80 rooms, with restaurant and bar amenities in a self-contained block.

The corporation also intended to redevelop the older motel block with higher - density, selfcontained units, said Mr Lapwood. The general manager of the T.H.C. (Mr A. Young) said the new Hermitage wing would allow for more than 30,000 additional visitors.

The T.H.C. was conscious of Mount Cook’s basic role as a national park.

“That is why we have been prepared to forgo certain developments in the area we administer, because we felt that the public interest would be better served if they were placed elsewhere,” Mr Young said. “I am sure we all recognise that the development of Mount Cook must continue, because it is so important to our tourist industry. Its development must be appropriate to modern tourist demand, but it must also be in keeping with the environment of a national park,” he said. The new wing at the Hermitage, which rises behind the older building, has an exterior finish of fairfaced concrete and rough-sawn timber. All rooms look towards Mount Sefton and the Hooker Valley.