HEADLANDS OF OTAGO

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22894, 30 May 1936, Page 5

HEADLANDS OF OTAGO

OCEANIC VISTAS 11. By ANbREW Southland. The grey sea fog, sweeping upwards and around the mountain aide like the spent and dissolving breath of the ocean, is not without its compensations. It was lifting as we crossed the neck of the peninsula and came upon the shimmering reaches of Papanui Inlet, which place, for some reason or other, the neighbouring settlers call Wickliffe Bay. Here and there, descending to the surface of the inlet from the coastal road, are metalled inclines for the use of travellers who choose to take a short cut over the sands at low tide. Out of the fog, as we trudge along, comes the clop-clop of a trotting horse, followed presently by the outlines of a long-shafted gig heading across the shallows. The chiaroscuro of fog enhances the size of most objects. Sheep, looming vaguely against the skyline, become oxen; starlings swinging on a wire are crows, and a solitary horse, dozing and motionless on a hazeenveloped ridge, is nothing less than a prehistoric monster. A similar distortion affects the scenery, and amid unfamiliar surroundings the most commonplace features of the landscape become weirdly impressive to the puzzled eye. When viewed thus, at a steep and unwonted angle, knolls and hillocks emerging suddenly from the gaps in the curtains of sluggish vapour, with no intervening landmark to lend perspective, become mountains of startling proportions. When the foreground is obscured by fog, and all sense of relative distance is thereby effaced, a moderately high hill assumes the fantastic dimensions of a Tcneriffe or Egmont divested of its snows. In reality such an eminence may he just bulky enough to shelter a prosaic farmstead. Such illusions, however, are not related to the apparent enlargement of objects seen through a fog-screen, or as frequently happens, against abnormally brilliant light. Looking towards Otago Heads (as we surmise), where the fog is unfolding in parallel layers of white against the sun. we see a glorious panorama of mountainous land, its height and majesty increased, as we ascend the winding hillside road, by the swimming void at our feet. Far below, misty and indistinct through the melting haze, lies the basin of the inlet, with silvery channels converging to a single bed of deeper water between the sandspit of Wickliffe Bay and the steep flank of Saunders Peninsula. Beyond the outlet, to seaward, there is nothing but the lowering gloom of fog and the sound of the surf, with a background, as it were, of heaving waters stretching unbroken to the barriers of an ice-laden continent. In spite of the distinctions and divisions of the map-makers, there is something about the universal and unchecked nature of ocean water that appeals tb the imagination in a way that the more stable element of land can never suggest. The scant film of water overlying the sands of these Antipodean inlets, so shallow, tame and accessible that it barely covers the webbed feet of waterfowl, and is 'scooped up and retained for a passing hour by playing children—this water embodies more romance than the most storied portion of the solid earth, simply because it lives. At some time or other its particles have fallen as silent snow on lofty mountain ranges a hemisphere removed from its present retreat among the encircling hills of Otago; or it, has descended on steaming equatorial jungles In torrential showers. To-morrow, following the coastal current, it will be borne southward to mingle with the chill waters of Antarctica, there to undergo a further redistribution and a new orientation. Bach of the hundreds of tides that enter these inlets in the course of a single year will leave a sample, however small, of water that has washed the shores of strange and exotic lands. If there is any praise due to the natural but purely pagan sentiment that prompts an exile to cherish a handful of his native soil, surely there is something to be said for this universal element, known to chemists as H2O, in different degrees of . salinity, as we see it in its varying moods up and down the world; breaking rhythmically on sunlit beaches, battering the cliffs with thunderous din and flying spray, and on the ocean:

Icing the Pole, or in the torrid clime Dark, heaving, boundless, endless and sublime. The image of eternity, the throne Of the Invisible. . . . It is quite a fascinating diversion, while lying on a grassy hollow above the sea, with skylarks carolling above, and inquisitive seafowl skirting the edge of the cliffs, to “ time ” the breaking of the waves upon a neighbouring beach. There are certainly loss profitable forms of filling an idle hour —one could name a dozen, all eminently popular and in good repute—but there comes a time and a mood when the sea will not brook our frivolous whim, and it is then that we begin to realise how futile are our efforts to cultivate an affinity with the great waters of the earth. The dread significance of “ Invisible ” and “ Eternity ” bids us pause, and we feel that the poet’s apostrophe

Thou glorious mirror where the Almighty’s form

is the utterance of awe rather thau of admiration. No; there is little to bo said for the sea. In charity some call her a fickle mistress; but most of her lovers tell, sooner or later, of treachery and ill-requited affection. The transition from sea to land is abrupt and dramatic in its completeness on these dizzy heights. The slopes are grass-grown to the verge of the beetling cliffs, and in some places there is a fringe of flax, stunted fern and wiry veronica rooted in their own mould, with the underlying face of the crag hollowed by wind and weather. The approach is perilous; yet one cannot resist a morbid temptation to look over. Below is a murky abyss, flanked on one side by a forbidding black wall and on the other by the incoming fog, which, striking the dank surface of the cliff full on, creeps and swirls upward, bringing with it a chilly draught from the sunless depths. The surf booms and seethes in the gloom, and at times there is a noticeable tremor and reverbi|ration when a larger wave strikes a cavity in the cliff.. The shore itself is still shrouded in mist; but the sun breaks through for an instant and illumines the crest of the grassy headland. A skylark, enlivened by the heartsome glow, sings a few bars, and a pipit—most southerly of passerine birds —flits and chirps briskly around us. It is a relief to turn orice more to the familiar realities of the land.

As the fog finally withdraws many signs of civilisation and recent settlement meet the eye; —new homesteads, roads, fences taut and trim, and some presentable live stock, and. what is not frequently seen in this part of New Zealand, numerous injunctions against trespassing. But there is not much hereabouts to tempt a wayfarer to transgress the rights of these pioneers. Theirs must be at best a Patagonian existence, unrelieved, as far as I could gather, by any appreciation of the natural amenities that might render tolerable a lifelong residence on these wind-ridden farmlets. There is a marked absence of planted trees in the locality, and signs abound to prove that the old feud between man and bush is being prosecuted with traditional disregard for aesthetics and economy. What Mount Charles will look like 50 years hence nobody seems to care. By that time, however, there

will be a progressive association, with aerial transport to the top of the mountain, and a pais man to collect the empty bottles and other discards of Sunday trippers. But there will be no trees. The last meagre relics of wild life—the hawks and rabbits of to-day—-will be mere legends in the lore of the local naturalist. Thus civilisation! Yet, by looking down on the sea-girt expanse of Saunders Peninsula, one imagines it as a rarely favoured haunt for peregrine falcons and sea-eagles. Before we leave the neighbourhood of the lighthouse the sea-fog has shrunk towards the horizon, and from this considerable height it is difficult to determine precisely where air and water meet. The trailing smoke from a north-bound steamer may be 20 miles away, and the horizon is well beyond that. Cape Saunders now stands boldly revealed in the sunlight, though a wisp of fog still lingers in the lee of the headland, retained by some combination of air currents. Surveying the promontory thus, its sunlit brow raised high apd serene against the opposing ocean, as thousands have beheld it since Cook me -k-d it as his landfall more than 150 years ago, one must admit that as a memorial it is one that an emperor might envy.

Yet from slavish regard for manufactured and conventional tributes to greatness or even transitory fame, the honour of a geographical name is held in negligible esteem. The privilege has been debased by unworthy occasions. In their zeal to feed the vanity of patrons and masters, the navigators of old perpetuated a number of questionable distinc- i tions, and we have only to examine the i maps of modern explorers to discover j that geographical memorials' are still , at a discount. No Briton, however, has cause to cavil at the naming of Caja* ; Saunders. A cormorant is flying resolutely seaward as we take our last look at- the Cape. Half a mile out its flight is intercepted by a wavering string of sea-fowl travelling so close to the water that they appear to be skimming the undulations of the ocean swell. Mutton-birds, or shear-waters, on their northerly migration. Not a bird deviates from the narrow ranks, and the strange aerial procession moves onward, unbroken and unchecked, till we are tired of watching it. It is a sight that gladdens our ornithological hearts.