NEW ZEALAND’S RHINE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 55, 29 February 1912, Page 8

NEW ZEALAND’S RHINE.

WANGANUI RIVER DESCRIBED BY A VISITOR. FULL DETAILS~OF THE TRIP. A recent visitor writes of this great national asset in the following glowing and complimentary terms: — The Wanganui River is the most beautiful scenic river in New Zealand, and affords a magnificent riverroad into the heart of the North Island. It rises in the mountainous centre of the Island, and flows for about 200 miles through densely forested country. For much of this distance it runs in deep-cut canyons, narrow and walled by precipitous cliffs clothed with ferns and topped by lovely woods. The river is navigable for 1-10 miles from the sea, as far up as Taumarunui, where it is tapped by the Main Trunk railway line, 175 miles from Auckland and the same distance from Wellington. For two days the traveller voyages down the river by launch and steamer until the town of Wanganui is reached, close to the sea.

The river is a region of singular (enchantment. It is so unlike anything one sees in the outside world; and the traveller who has once run through the watery . canyons of the Wanganui River never forgets the exjpbrfencb'. The cruise down these fairy waterways, with the cool, fragrant forests all around, the gorgeous shadow-pictures in the water, the wonderful wild gardens of ferns on the banks, the murmur of the little waterfalls and the rush of the river in one’s ears, 'is one of the most truly delightful in this land of a thousand fine tourist pilgrimages. The wonderful reflections are one of the delights of a fine weather trip on the Wanganui. The leafy glories of the forest, overhanging sprays of wild flowers, the tall tree ferns, the vivid crimson and green and gold of the mossy ,river walls, are all mirrored with an added lustre in the deep waters. One spot of particularly unforgetful beauty is the Kirikiriroa reach—just below ,a long rapid, where a bold cliff, called by the Maoris “Koinaki’s Leap,” juts out into the 'stream like a battleship’s ram bow, Hvith an old Maori settlement on a wooded terrace opposite, and long curving hillside thickly covered with pongf), tree ferns. The twenty-mile run from the mouth of the Tangarakau tributary to Pipiriki—the last portion of the day’s run from Taumarunui—is the finest bit of the whole river. Here the Wanganui flows through a deep and narrow defile between lofty walls of smooth and water-polished papa rock, Te Wahi-pari, “The Place of Cliffs.” The upper part of the papa walls are beautiful with many-coloured garment of sword grasses, 'soft , moss and clinging ferns, kept always fresh and green by the down-trickling rivulets, and topped far above by the forests. The songs of the birds, heard as one passes through these dark ravine's, come down from above very faintly. We shoot down past gloomly little gorges, like deep knife cuts, arched by trees. In the depths tinkle waterfalls. There are deep cave-like openings where the black water swirls' and eddies, and there are dark cliffcaves, in Maori legend the haunt of the taniwha and macro, fabulous monsters of river and Avilderness and “wild men of the woods.”

Very deep, very swift is the river :is it sweeps down through tire dark canyon. Now and again rocky shoals 'bar its course. It leaps them in a turmoil of flying water. Through tho whirl and spray of the rapids, shoots the light launch like an arrow in its flight, and dancing through the waves speeds into another smooth reach; and so rapid alternates with calm water until Pipiriki is reached. Here there is a large and comfortable house to stay for the travellers, and a large winter garden. Here the tourist transfers to the steamer for Wanganui.

The native population on the upper Waters of the Wanganui is small. It is not until Pipiriki is passed that one sees much of Maori life. Then village after village (kainga, in the Maori tongue) is seen, each set on a green river terrace, embowered in groves of fruit and shade trees, and surrounded by plantations of potatoes, kumera, maize, tobacco, and clumps of cultivated flax.

Low caved dwellings and cagved meeting houses, with their decorated barge boards, fancifully fretworked 'and brightly painted, surround the central marae, or village square. Behind the houses are high-legged pataka's, or food stores. Long canoes, each hewn out of a single tree, are drawn up on tho banks or swing ,in tho current. The great number of canoes on tho river is in fact one ,of tho remarkable features of tho Wanganui ; and the sight of tho canoeload of Maori voyagers is a frequent and pretty picture. The trip can also be made up stream from Wanganui.