MARLBOROUGH SOUNDS

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 24, 29 January 1924, Page 9

MARLBOROUGH SOUNDS

(By K.S.)

IDEAL HOLIDAY RESORT

A TRIP WORTH WHILE '

WINDING WATERY SOLITUDES.

Have you ever been to the Marlborough Sounds? Ask this question of any Wellingtonian, and see how few there are who have made the journey across Cook Strait to spend as delightful a holiday as one could wish for anywhere. At this time of the year, early as it may be, work is now one. of the things to think of occasionally, but holidays will come again next Christmas and New Year, and if people decide now where they will spend their next vacation husbands and wives, and those -of single station, will have no need to have numerous after-dinner arguments between next June and December as to where they will spend their next holiday. None could do better than visit Marlborough Sounds. THE SEA^S THE HIGHWAY. Winding in and out for over 500 miles of coastline, the Sounds have been deßcribe,d as the "waters of restfulness." This pen-picture-in-chief is a truly correct . representation of the Sounds when the ripples reflect the rays' of the sun in myriad scintillations under cloudless, skie^, but when the winds roar and the face of the sun" is hidden behind lowering clouds, the " waters of restfulness ". can rapidly become seas of turbulence and the cockpit of a launch becomes about as exciting a place as the " cockpit of Europe." On such occasions onel has a feeling that he would prefer to get cut and walk, but it has to be remembered that1 in the Sounds there are no roads. The mountain-girt seaways are the only roads •in the Sourids. But whether the. waters are at rest qr in anger, the Sounds remain a delight to the weary soul, and to honeymooners they are a realm, of Elys-ium-like bliss. Going-away costumes are familiar garments in the Sounds. "DOING " THE SOUNDS. The are various, ways of " doing " the Sounds. Three hours' tossing from Wellington, a two-berth cabin, and a dose of mal-de-mer brings one to the entrance to Tory Channel, and another hour find's the boat moored to Picton Wharf. If accommodation has not been booked beforehand, and the season is busy, ,• one's mind may be adequately filled with perplexities and doubts as to where to lay one's -head (or two heads) until "mine hostess" discovers ways and means of putting you up. This problem out of the way, the rest is. easy*. It is only a matter of having plenty of time and possessing the requisite amount of wealth. Some folk prefer to see all there is to bo seen in Queen Charlotte Sound by making Picton their headquarters, and arranging ' daily launch trips to tWnumerous lovely'bays with their golden.sandy beaches; others have their minds on some bush-clad inlet, where they may pitch a camp; while others again devote the whole of the time to launching and sight-seeing, first ir. Queen Charlotte Sound, then, in Pelorus and Kenepuru Sounds. Nine or ten days can be devoted to such a launch trip, camping en route, and it is doubtful' whether a more pleasant holiday can be spent, provided always, that the clerk of the weather gets out on the right side of the bed each morning. REMNANTS OF LOVELY BUSH. Between''Queen Cliarlotte and Pelorus and' Kenepuru Sounds there is a vast difference from the scenic poiji't of view. Long years ago the hills about Queen Charlotte Sound ..were, cleared of their bush. to make way for the fleece which is meant to become, golden,: and they have suffered in this respect in no small degree. Fire and axe have- also penetrated far into the Pelorus, but there are still some forest-clad peaks and hills, with their wealth' of native flora, and here €he tui, bell-bird, andpigeon ever live in peace, for a wise Government has decreed that such spots shall be sanctuaries, where man and bird may commune with Nature in unison far from the world of work and ehotguns. Light and shade, sunshine' and shadow, long vistas of blue and emerald, such are the never-ending beauties of Pelorus and Kenepuru' Sounds. Oh,; lovely' Sounds,1 may you ever give the weary rest! , ' ■ - J; - _SPORT>OR THE FISHER. For the pure picnicker,- perhaps, Queen Charlotte Sound is to be preferred to Pelorus, because it has such a multitude of yellow, shingly beaches hidden away here.and there in snug little coves and inlets. Pelorus, of which Kenepuru is I really a blind arm, has wider stretches o* water, with bays running far between the hills. The fisherman will get more sport m Pelorus Bound these days than in Queen Charlotte Sound. A few years a 5". °iWen, Charlotte Sound abounded with fish, but now it. is only an occasional cod that will attach itself to an Isaac Waltoman disciple's.line there. If it is fish that one is. after, it is advisable to try Pelorus Sound, more particularly towards the Heads. Here there is no end o f d snapper, and hapuka. Cod fishing is beloved oi the ladiesf who delight to haul in their catch« in most unfishermanlike style and eqneal in hieh soprano if they merely hook the spotty. The adveat of an occasional shark adds zest to the scene. "Yes it is lonely in the Sounds," avers the settler to whom you hazard your feelings anent the solitudes around you at evening time. "But one gets used to it When one is born here he ■knows nothmg else if he hasn't been # it of it, and if he has been out of it he just puts up with it. The Sounds, though, have gone back. There are not so many families here-now as there used to be one time. They have .gone When one scans the country across the water and sees gre,at bare hilli which once were covered with beautiful bush the tourist feels that it was almost a good thing for the Sounds that the settler did in some cases go away He "may have come in the first place to build up a home, but yet determined not to remain long before he pulled down the bush in what the Nature-lover is almost prone to regard as "wanton destruction, Sawmills and clearing the high lands for sheep have been responsible tor the tearing down.of the bush but it were well that the lovely Sounds were rendered no more naked but be clothed in their rightful garb of wood Such a picture would they make, that from the Bcenic point of view reafforestation would seem to be a most desirable thing. Where sheep are not beinjr run the rugged hills seem to cry out for trees. '■ Owing to its mountainous nature, most of the land ■in the Sounds is suitable for nothing but sheep* but here and there where there are flats the settler has established himself and dairvrng is in full swing. As yet the Sounds boast only one butter factory. This is in Pelorua, and nupplies to it hiivs to bs con""Wd, often very loaa distanww. hv

launch. At one time there were numerous sawmills in the Sounds, but the number is now very small, although there is talk of others being established. The. pity of it is that some of the bush that is left and unprotected may soon disappear! MEANS OF COMMUNICATION. Motor launch and telephone are the only means of communication in the Sounds, and with the, latter one does not experience an overbearing sense of -separation from civilisation, such as.the solitude of the Sounds is calculated to instil. Telephonic communication is to be had with any part of the Sounds, any part of the South Island in fact, but there are some homesteads which are not connected up. Where this is the case ,there is no means of getting in touch with one's nearest "neighbour," who, might be three or ten miles away, except by launch. With hills running right down to the water's edge there can be no roads, but winding over and around those hills are narrow tracks. If a settler or traveller followed the tracks, however, it might be many a long day before he could get to the other side., of a channel of water which might only be a mile or a mile and a half wide. The settler who braves life in the Sounds without the telephone has a heart indeed, for there<are parts of the district which appear to the visitor,to be the veritable "back of beyond." At various places in the Sounds post arid telegraph offices are established. These insitutions are very humble and unpretentious for the most part,, but they serve a need to the back country man, and though the volume of business which they transact may not greatly swell the coffers of the Department, they should be allowed to exist. If economy has to be practised 'it should not be tried out on the man who is living amongst the hills - and great silences en» deavouring to produce something for the country's benefit as well as his own. A QUEER MAIL SERVICE, In any case the Sounds mail service is such a wonderful undertaking that it should ever, be allowed to remain at once a source of long-suffering to the settler and a thing of slow torture to the tourist. Twice a week a mail launch meanders about Pelorus and Kenepuru Sounds, and at certain times, if one posts a letter from, say; Crail Bay to Nelson, it is transported first of all to French Pass (which-is four hours' journey from Nelson), transhipped to steamer, brought on to Wellington, and then sent on to Nelson the next day. By the time the reply is received one has forgotten that he ever was on holiday, or that he eye'r wrote anything requir-, ing''an answer. It is surprising the number of good( accommodation houses there are to be found in the. many lonely but lovely bays in the Sonnets, and one can always be assured of being; well entertained, if not by the hosts, then -by their guests. If one has a small family of exuberant youngsters it is not at all unlikely that a bevy of elderly spinsters will be found whose conjugal condition is such that they feel quite competent to advise young paTenJ-s on the way they should train up their offspring. In a place where other amusements are not to be had one may obtain ample enjoyment from the lecturettes qf these ladies. If you are not married, but going to be if you can't help it, then the evening hours can profitably be whiled away by listening to doleful tales from school mistresses on holiday as to the niggardliness of the" Government in the matter of leave and pay, the unkempt condition of the average New Zealand school in compai/son.with that in the Sahara or somewhere else, the dearth of suitable literature iwith which-to regale the minds of ithe , New Zealand pupil, and the fact that if it were hot for ample supplies'" of the "Ladies' Home Journal" being available the children of New Zealand would never learn to. read. AH these things ire what one encounters in the* Sounds on a holiday, but they help to'make'the holiday worth while. . '