A FLY CAMP.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 151, 26 June 1912, Page 16

A FLY CAMP.

few yards apart, with a fly in between a little higher than the tent flys and overlapping them. Where space is limited, the fly is pitched in front of one of the tents. B unks of fern are made on the ground, with logs to keep it in position, and a rough table of saplings is constructed under the fly to keep stores on. The fireplace is made under the centre of the fly and keeps both the tents warm in the winter months. As the work proceeds the fly camps are shifted to keep in touch, and so the survey goes on. Trie paiiy usually makes back to the main camp on Saturday evening and swag out the week's stores on the Monday morning. CUTTING TRACKS. When all the work within one day's swag from the main camp is completed then the main camp itself is transferred to a good central position again for the rest of the block. If possible a packtrack is cut on to the new main camp site, but if the country is too rough and gorgy then everything has to be swagge'd. In making the pack-track the trees and scrub are cut out just wide enough to allow a horse to get along with a pack load. The boggy little creeks are bridged with pungae, and the steep faces are roughly benched out just wide enough to give a foothold to the horses. In the Waimarino blocks the creeks are very gorgy, and co nearly all the camps had to be shifted per swag. HOW GORGES WERE CROSSED. Besides preventing pack-tracks these gorges were a great nuisance all through the survey. In some places they would be about a chain wide and 150 feet deep ; at others only a few yards wide and aboui 50 fee-fc deep. On tho main walking tracks trees were felled for bridges, and in every case several had to be cut down before one would land without smashing. to pieces and disappearing down the gorge. Some of the trees would have a nasty lean on, and these would be roughly adzed on top and a wire put across as a hand Tail for safety in swagging across. In taking shoit cuts home to camp after the day's work these gorges would be met with at aU sorts of unexpected places^ and cau-^e delays that in winter months often meant a scramble home in the dark for the latter part of the journey. Where the gorges were not very deep they could be crossed with the aid 1 of a iong sapling. One would • be cut, leaving a good strong branch as a hook, and the- parly would shin down this and transfer it across to the j other side hooking It on a root or a projecting branch, and then perform the monkey act again. SUNDAY AND HONEY. Sunday is always a busy day at a survey camp — washing day, hunting day, mending day, writing day, and .general odd job -day. Perhaps a "bee" tree has; been seen during the week's woik, and some of the men will start off to get the honey. A hole is cut in the tree below the' hive and the bees stupefied with smoke. Some of the hives yield as much as two kerosene , tine of good honeycomb. The comb is generally fairly dirty with bits of wood and dm t I'iom inside tho tree, so 'it is hung up Woie the Hie iv muslin and Uioicughly stiained. Bul.li honey ifa biipp<'»<xl to be iJoiMJiiuus v lieu the "raugioia" chrub la ill flower. The pokon disappears once th.fi. hmox is &£Oggd 1^ th£ aJ£ |o£ a

home the meat. All hands 6tarted out with bags and swag straps after lunch. During the afternoon it came on to rain and blow very heavily, and when the party arrived back about dusk with a big load up each, wet through, they found the tents as flat as a pancake, with a large tawa tree lying across them. Usually on a Sunday afternoon all hands are reading before the fire, and if it hadn't been for the cattle hunt probably all of them would have been killed. TWO THRILLING EXPERIENCES. On another occasion the wire rope supporting the cage across the Manganui-o-te-ao River broke when three of the men were crossing, and- they fell into the river about 15ft below. One of them couldn't swim, and another was half stunned by the cage, but all got out safely, though some of the mail was lost. Whilst out hunting one of the surveyors had a narrow escape from a beast which he had wounded. ~He followed the animal down into a gully at the bottom of which was a small creek, with steep slippery papa sides. Noticing the tracks f^g .down into this, he slid down, to find himself about two chains away from the animal, which charged on sight. Taking a hasty shot with the Snider, he dropped it and scrambled up a small punga leaning out from the bank. The beast passed so close that it touched his- leg. Then it staggered on a few yards and came down with a crash. The bullet had found its mark. AN INCIDENT OF THE WINTER, After Easter the weather usually breaks, and the bush is wet every day, and everything about the camp fee'l6 damp. A few wet days in succession gives everyone the blues, and the men will go out hunting in the wet or slip out^ for tho mail for something to occupy their time. In one fly camp it had been raining continuously for some days, and the camp was out of reading matter, so two of the men started out for the mail. Taking a cross-country trip through the bush, they reached the Manganui-o-te-ao, only to find it in high flood and the wire rope supporting the cage broken by a falling tree. Nothing daunted; they stripped off, leaving their boots behind and tying their clothes, in a, bundle round their heads, and swam the river, one of them dropping his clothes en route and getting them soaked.' However, they donned their clothes, and then walked four miles barefooted for the mail, and then returned to camp' the same way. . BACK TO THE CITY' BUT THE BI T SII IS CALLING. As the weather f;elo wetter and colder the surveyor anil his nie.u look forward to the winter vacation: It in usual for the surveyor to retire to the office for tho -worst months to do the final mapping,, calculations, ami reports. The men are paid oIT. some of them goin^ iw a holiday, others taking on temporary bushteliitig jobs. CJettiny; back to a city is like a visit to fairyland, and the buildings, lit up with electric light, look like palaces. The change is thoroughly appreciated, but before long, as soon as the days begin to lengthen and the sun j gets a bit waim, tho surveyor experiI euces the "call of the wild.*' and lun^s to get back to the camp ajraui. The oftico seems sruih . and he begins to <u>t restless, and he doesn't iccl at hunie until ho tfets bdck Under cuivufc v.itli Mi & Fioihas off.