On the road to Hanmer . . .

Press, 12 September 1981, Page 15

On the road to Hanmer . . .

Few travellers to Hanmer bother to pause now at the bridge over the Waiau River just beyond where the road to Hanmer itself leaves the Lewis Pass highway. With Hanmer only ten minutes away, most minds are already on the hot pools. If travellers do pause it will probably be to admire the bridge itself — a single lane supported on two inverted triangular frames of steel which rest on sturdy concrete piers standing in the depths of the river's gorge. This bridge, one of Canterbury’s notable early civil engineering works, is now approaching 100 years old, but it was not the first bridge built on the site. In 1864. a 120-foot high arch built entirely of timber was thrown across the gorge. This scaffolding-like struc-

ture — “the most interesting and spectacular of the early South Island bridges" — was somewhat flexible, in spite of stay wires, and finally blew down in November. 1874. It was not replaced until 1887, by which time bath houses had been erected in Hanmer (in 1883-84). and the railway from Christchurch completed to Culverden (in 1885-86). Both of these led to increased traffic into the South Island's only “spa" and made necessary the replacement of the ferry by the bridge which still stands today. Although today’s travellers have no reason to stop at the Waiau Gorge bridge, there was. for many years, an accommodation house or

By

JOHN WILSON

hotel on a terrace at the western end of the bridge which became a regular calling place for the coaches running between Culverden and Hanmer. The three successive buildings which served as hotel or accommodation house on the site provide an interesting record of the districts growth, from the pioneering days when a simple slab whare was all that was needed to accommodate passing travellers, through a larger, verandahed, but still single-storey building, to a substantial, two-storey, weatherboard hotel. This third hotel, built in 1905, was a commodious structure with a deep verandah gracing the outside and

with 30 bedrooms within. It was lit throughout, when it opened, by acetylene gas. The road beyond the Hanmer turn-off, which now crosses Lewis Pass, was in those days a dead-end, known as the Glen Wye road. The large hotel of 1905 was built to cater to picnic parties and anglers. It served as a stopping place for the Hanmer coaches, and on its opening the management announced that it intended to run a conveyance of its own daily between the hotel and Hanmer. Part of this third Waiau Gorge hotel still stands, although it has ceased being a hotel long since. In about 1914 the Rutherford family divided its Montrose station, and the hotel and the freehold land around it were bought to serve as a home-

The three hotels which illustrate the growth of the Waiau Gorge area from pioneering times. Nothing of the first two and only a part of the third now remain.

stead for that part of the run which was without one. The house is still occupied by Rutherfords. The new owners, however, eventually let the building’s licence lapse. The bridge became less popular as a stop-ping-off place as transport to Hanmer improved — the first motor coach service from Culverden began in November, 1907. After the hotel became a station homestead, part of it was demolished: later extra rooms were built on to the other end as the family grew. Although not improved architecturally * by these changes, the house remains’ an interesting reminder of the days when the Waiau Gorge bridge was important enough as a stopping-off point for travellers to Hanmer to warrant its own hotel.