"OVER THE HILLS."

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19932, 28 April 1928, Page 1 (Supplement)

"OVER THE HILLS."

TAPU TO MERCURY BAY.

B3T ELSIE K. MORTON.

From Tap'i to Mercury Bay was indeed " over the hills and far away" in days gone by! Just a little winding packtrack, cut through the fastnesses of the Coromandel Ranges, down precipitous mountain slopes, through stretches of dark, wild forest, over swift-flooding torrents and out at last, thirty miles away, to the marshes and mangroves of Whitianga Harboui. The old pack-track is now a thing of the past; lordly limousines and lumbering lorries make their way up and down the new Tapu-Coroglen road. " But they followed our old track!" declared the Old I'ioneer, with triumphant nods. " The smart surveyor chaps couldn't map out anything much better than the old track wo cleared with our slash-hooks and axes forty year ago!" A typical JNew Zealand mountain road it is to-day, with hairpin bends, steep grades, and magnificent panoramas of native forest As a tourist route, the new Tapu-Coroglen Road is as yet practically unknown. Thames knows all about it, 01 course, and VVaikato too, and during tho Eastei holiday motors by the score went speeding over Uie hills to Mercury Bay, wdeie the big fish gambol in the blue waves. But the new road is only fit, as yet, for summer traffic. When completed, it will givo all-the-year road access to Mercury Bay, practically isolated when winter rains have brought lloods and slips to the longer Coromandel route. The Tapu-Coroglen road is one of the Government Relief works, and men are now at work building concrete bridges, and filling in the fifteen mile gap as yet unmetalled. When completed, it will rival Waipoua and Motu as one of the great forest roads of the North Island. Into the Bills. The mists still shroud tho bush-clad peaks when we set forth on our journey ovei the hills. For oome miles we follow a winding road through Tapu Gorge, with glimpses of dark, thunder-blue ranges ahead, and beside the narrow way, deep pools of green and silver, that hold in mirrored beauty the roadside cliffs and rocky banks. Soon we pass a little cluster of Maori whares, real old-time thatched whares of plaited nikau frond and pi nga trunk. Dark-eyed pickaninnies play beside the open door; bunches of golden' maize cobs hang to dry from a nearby tree, and well-scrubbed frying pans and tin tubs, hung on nails outside the door, glitter in the morning sunshine like battle shields ol conquering knights. This is tho home of the kauri-climbers, those fearless fellows who thrust spiked feet into King Kauri's smooth sides and climb skyward to dig gum out of his eyebrows with no more to-do than a fly walking upside down across the ceiling! Past the buiih camp, over the litttle bridge, and uf into the mountain road, with clatter of gears, and roaring engine. Now the full grandeur of the Coromandel Ranges begins to unfold before our eyes. The road is but a ledge hewn in the mountain side. To our right rises the sheer cliff-face, flaming red, streaked with mauve and ochre, crowned with luxuriant drooping ferns. On our left, the hillside drops down—down—a dizzy thousand feet into miles of bush-filied valley. The forest rises beyond in terraced leagues of matchless grandeur, tier upon tier, each lofty hill-crest crowned with groves of kauri, rimu and rata. Waipoua itself holds nothing more beautiful than these untouched kauri groves of Coromandel, rising majestic to the very foot of Maumapaki. fantastic, three-humped " Camel's Back," 2668 ft. above sea-level, a vast outcropping of stone, bush-covered, rugged, remote, perched like some giant's castle high on i he skyline. Where the Rata Blooms. The rata is in full bloom beside the road, and its crimson glory is like a banner rippling over tho ocean of green that fills the valleys and mounts the highest hills. On the opposite ridge, the grey boles of a magnificent stand of kauri rise like the columns of some ancient forest temple. Upward we climb, half-way to the sky, until at last wo view the matchless panorama from the divide, over twelve hundred feet above sea-level. Then the long, long downward run, still through pillared aisles of tho forest, with vistas of bush and rugged mountain spur unfolding at everv turn, deep valleys clothed in treo ferns, and as we top the crest of a. high ridge, a glimpse of Taurauikau, Table Mountain, over two thousand feet in height, rising darkly blue in tho distance.

Summer still lingers in tho hills, and for many a mile the road is bordered with blackberries, laden with luscious fruit. Presently wo come to Five-Mile Creek, and the Government relief works camp. About fifty men are employed on the new road, and the double row of neat white tents makes a little Canvas Town on the banks of the creek. A long up-grade brings us to a point overlooking Coroglen, the humble little Gumtown of bygone days. Here are fertile fields, plantations, and flourishing farms. In a distant field, a woman is working a team of Horses, with a tiny child toddling at her side. Evidently the pioneering days are not yet over, even though old Gumtown has blossomed out with a brand new, romantic naino! In tho foreground, tho Waiwawa Creek trails a silver thread through the landscape. one of peaceful rural beauty after the rugged grandeur of the ranges. A few miles farther on we come to mangrove swamps and tidal creeks, and the breeze brings to us the clean, salt tang of the sea. Historic Whitianga. And so, at midday, clown the quiet little main street of Whitianga, on tlie shores of Mercury Bay, one of the prettiest little seaside townships you could ever hope to find. Whitianga is as yet utterly unspoiled. It lias its bowser pumps, its butter factory, and a handsome modern hotel, but these innovations have not destroyed its quaint, old-world charm. It holds something of the rare, peaceful beauty of historic Akaroa. And Whitianga is historic too, for out there on one of tho great bluffs beyond Buffalo Beach, in November 1769, Captain Cook observed the Transit of Mercury, and bestowed upon this remote bay its name. A splendid holiday-making resort is Buffak Beach, wide and smooth, curving deeply between two rocky headlands, where the long ocean rollers come riding smoothly in, their while crests sparkling in the sunshine. Out in the open ocean beyond, the sens are tossing and tumbling, and clouds of white spray dash against the needle-pointed, rocky islets set between tho guarding headlands, but inside the bay, the long preen rollers break smoothly, and children are plunging joyously in tho surf.

When you go to Whitianga, take a walk down the clvan, grass-bordered streets, along the white-shelled paths that wander up and down past old-time orchards, where giant mulberry and walnut trees tower over quaint picket fences that belong to tho days of long ago. Tuke a stroll too, along tho waterfront past the wharf, where nets are drying in the sun, and wheeling sea-birds clamour for the fishermen's return.

In Whitianga, you will hear much talk of sword-fish and mako, of thrilling pursuits, and battles with giants of the deep. But if you, like myself, have had enough of encounters and giants, and seek only peace and solitude, shun tho company of all such heroes of the deep, and enwrapped in dreams of long ago, take your < rest there beside tho sea, at the end of the road.