Taking the 1866 cure: a test of strength

Press, 18 February 1989, Page 26

Taking the 1866 cure: a test of strength

JENNY VIDGEN, after researching the files of nineteenth century newspapers, writes that . a strong constitution was needed by Europeans travelling to Hanmer Springs.

One of the earliest tourists to visit the hot springs at Hanmer was an anonymous American who later wrote of his journey in 1866 from Christchurch to a sheep station, St Helens, which was then leased from Count de la Pasture’s brother by D. W. Delamain.

This traveller had left Christchurch in an American leather sprung coach drawn by four horses, but by the time he and his companion reached the Waiau River the next day, they were seated in a horse and cart. Even this mode of transport had to be discarded at the ferry crossing. The river was in flood and the ferry grounded on a gravel bank. The crossing was made on horses the ferryman brought over. "Have you tried it?” the traveller later wrote. "When the river is high and in one stream — the water surging and tumbling down upon you, everything moving except yourself and horse, which appears to have given up the attempt? “And just to allow things to take their chance, dizziness comes over one, a singing in both ears. The distant shore appears running along, minutes brighten into hours, the water reaches the seat of the saddle, the relentless torrent is going to wash you off, when joy! Your knees come out of the water and you see your horse is getting along.” With his host, he had visited the springs the evening he had arrived in Hanmer. The springs, he found, were a series of vilesmelling pools full of black water, surrounded by stunted manuka and bubbling mud. The wild scene, he later confessed, had reminded him of Macbeth’s meeting with the witches on a blighted heath — the rising mist shaping spectral forms in his

imagination. In fact, he shared his bath with a group of local shepherds who had set up their tents on firmer ground and were, when he arrived, soaking their worksore bodies in the largest of the springs. The traveller had wasted no time in joining them. With his body submerged and face tilted heavenward, he had observed the Southern Cross in the cold night sky while the moon rose over the mountains. Immersed in the warm water, he had listened to the calls of moreporks and bitterns. They had filled the frosty night air with a weird orchestration.

The next morning, he had again experienced the springs, but on arrival had found that upward of 20 faces were bobbing on the surface of the large pool. His party was forced to dip in one of the smaller baths that had accumulated many sticks and stakes.

Still, the anticipated pleasure of soaking one’s body in constant hot water meant clothing was discarded quickly in the cold morning air. On his third and final day at St Helen’s, he had visited the springs and pondered on the future of this oasis in the hills. “What a change will, in all probability, be there,” he later wrote. “Spacious bathhouses, grand saloons with mirrored walls and aids to luxury which upholstery can give;

gardens tastefully laid out, with terraced walls and lovers’ groves. The young will dance and flirt in the evening, the old amuse themselves with cards while listening to modem music.”

Later that day, he took a seven-mile ride to view the Waiau Gorge and the bridge that spanned it. “It appears so light and elegant as more to resemble a geometric spider’s web than a structure intended for the passage of men and animals. It is indeed a splendid sight, a light wooden bridge carried over a span of between 300 and 400 feet, built up, bit by bit, 150 feet above the rushing, roaring, boiling, seething torrent.” This swing bridge blew away in a strong nor’wester eight years later. Transport to the plains of Hanmer in those days was indeed a hazardous business. The travellers return journey was no less tedious and dangerous than his trip there. The morning he was to leave, he awoke to find it had been snowing. Ignoring the manager’s warnings, the American and his host prepared to depart as business demanded. As they left the station, it again began to snow, but the two still rode towards the Leslie Hills.

On the track up through the pass, their horses’ hooves kept “balling” (collecting snow), but eventually they had reached the summit and found themselves above the storm. Behind them, the plain they had left that

morning was concealed by black, snow-laden clouds. To the east, where they were heading, the sky was an ethereal blue. This phenomenon amazed the traveller.

Near the foot of the pass, the perfect picnic spot was found. Ham and beef sandwiches were washed down with a bottle of beer, but no mention is made of the return crossing of the Waiau.

The traveller does, however, record a meeting with a swagger who asked how far it was to the Count’s. The Count de la Pasture owned Glynn Wye, the high country station 18 miles to the west.

To reach this station the man on foot would also have to cross the Leslie Pass — no road ran through the Waiau Gorge in those days. For both travellers, the American and the swagger, Christchurch must have seemed a long way off. A night’s rest at Rotherham for the travellers was had in one of the two hotels. “There is plenty of room for improvement in this village,” he later wrote. “It at present consists of two public houses, a magistrate’s courthouse and about three cottages.” Then, -in the morning, the traveller took a coach to Christchurch. In spite of the rough roads and river crossings he had been forced to take, he informs the reader he arrived feeling fresh and invigorated.

Though the Roads Board spent “large sums of money” on the road from Hurunui to the Waiau in the following years, the travelling public, one is told, preferred the tussock to the coarse metal that was spread on the tracks. The highway to Hanmer remained a road that tested a personas courage and stamina. It was to be another 16 years before a bridge spanned the

Waiau near the place where the two travellers shared their sandwiches with a swagger, and another five before a. replacement bridge was to span that river where the tourist had gazed at Handysides’ creation. On that day, the rejoicing in Hanmer was extreme, as the name of the flat where the refreshment tent stood informs us. Champagne Flat resounded to many toasts that day, and the wish of one celebrating the event was “that bridges were opened three or four times a year in the Amuri.”

With the building of accommodation houses and a railway line that took travellers from Christchurch to Culverden, tourists began to appear in the township of Hanmer. They came to “take the waters” — from July, 1884, the baths had become a Government institution and the little dressing room erected by Mr Fry of Jollies Pass Hotel in the early 1870 s had been replaced by four neat cottages, two of them bathhouses, surrounded by gardens and shrubberies.

In time, the early tourist’s prophecy became reality. From the 1890 s to the outbreak of the First World War, visitors enjoyed Victorian splendour at the resort.