CATERING FOR TOURISTS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVII, Issue 41, 18 October 1913, Page 5

CATERING FOR TOURISTS.

1$ ENOUGH BEING DONE; MOUNT ECMONT’S CLAIMS* Xew Zealand is to a great extent a tourist country. It is not, like Switzerland, dependent on the tourist as its main source of revenue, but many overseas visitors go to’ our beauty spots and a good many of our visitors come to the country merely lor the sake of our scenery. Xeiv Zealand cannot produce a counteroai: of the Xiagara Falls, the Rocky Mountains or the European Alps; but at the same time there are beauty spots in the country well worthy tin*, attention of the tourist. Area for area, perhaps, Xew Zealand has as many beauty spots as any country. The hot lakes district is probably unrivalled, the southern Alps provide fine scenery, and the cold lakes also have their attractiveness. A circumstance which will appeal to tourists—for all tourists are not millionaires—is that living in Xew Zealand is a great deal cheaper than in many other countries which hold out inducements to the tourist. -It is open to question if the Government has in the past done sufficient in the way of giving facilities for reaching our tourist resorts. It is not suggested that an effort should be made to bend the whole efforts of the Goverment towards catering for tourists and to convert the population into dependents on tourist traffic; but it is suggested that visitors from oversea, and no less the people of the country, are entitled to reasonable facilities for viewing our scenic wonders. Mr X. Fulton (Stratford), and Mr A. Brown (Midhirst), during their recent visit to the Old World, were together on a trip to the Swiss Alps and were greatly impressed with the fact that they conld travel to the vicinity of the snow-line by railway. There arc a number of lines in existence and the one which goes up to the celebrated Jungfrau ascends to a . height of five thousand feet above sea-level. The locomotives are propelled by steam and run on cogged rails. After using such a railway Mr Fulton’s thoughts naturally turned to Mount Egmont, and h‘e holds the opinion that the work of running a railway to the snow line or near it is a work which the Government of the country'should toke in hand or should extend facilities to Taranaki local bodies to enable them to carry out the work. There should, he thought, he ample power in Taranaki.streams to supply current for an electric railway., Mr Fulton stresses the point that if the railway were made the traffic would inevitably follow. At present tlie chief drawback to a visit to the Mountain was the cost and. the. .time necessary,. .AVUJ.i a railway the cost of transport would be considerably reduced and a good deal of sight-seeing could be done in one day, where at present a one-day trip to the Mountain did not give one much time on the Mountain itself.