THE CENTRAL BULLER.

Colonist, Volume XXII, Issue 2765, 5 October 1880, Page 3

THE CENTRAL BULLER.

■ WHB*^iHt ia to hs1 attributed to the foot; that the Central'Balle* has been reviled bo; pertinaciously tbafc it yet remains a sort of; tbrra incognita we are unable to, state; but .true it ib that of tbe whole, extent of country j .: lying between the Mbtupiko and the Inanga-i ' hUa, leiff is generally known than of almost! any other district in the South Island. We'j are fully aware that it is not only those to whose interests it may hare beim to retard the of the Nelson distriot who have spoken and reported of the Central Buller as a perfect wilderness, but men even who have; ac'oumulated'their entire possessions in Nelson; thavealso damned with faint praise this inlandj distriot. However, we venture to predict! that with better knowledge a very different 1 idea will be formed as to its capabilities in the: ,way of affording remunerative employment. for a large number of persons. For some: months past the Central Buller to has been made somewhat more accessible than was formerly the oase by having been connected with the Nelson inland mail service, and a "coadb, subsidized to run fortnightly between Fox Hill and Hampden, has been an important link in connecting with the more settled distriots of the Colony those pioneers who, with undaunted energy atid undeterred by immense difficulties, bad made their homes and theirjivelihood in the most inaccessible ;of the settled districts in New Zealand. It is < not^alpne that Buch a mail ooach oonveys their correspondence to those ,who, if not anxious to know what is transpiring in the outer world, are at all events solely dependent for everything in the way of luxury, and very largely so for, bare necessities too, upon the Town merchant; but the mail coach is an invaluable aid in other respeots. In a oountry where the saddle is indispensable, where con? veyancei are all but unknown, wholly so indeed with the exception of a few drays and a solitary Waggon, and these running only bo far as the main road is open ; to those who may be strioken down by illness or overtaken by an accident, the coach affords the only means by whioh they pan travel in order to obtain medical aid, But it js not our intention to write upon the advantage? of a mail coach, and in. what we have : written we merely wished to point out one advantage which ba's followed its introduction in the locality le"ferr'ed to, and whioh may not have been patent, to a mere superficial observer. In our present notice of this district it is our intention merely to give an account of a,trip lately taken by one of our staff, to refer to facts, and '■ to point out out one or two deductions whioh w& think may reasonably be: drawn • therefrom. In commencing the notioa of this trip we shall begin from the point where the mails are taken up the Fox Hill Railway Station. Every other ; Tuesday rooming at 7 o'clock the mail coach ! lakes':'its departure from this station, and after passing through Fox Hill and Bell Grove, proceeds t« ascend the Spooner's Eange. To those who have not visited Fox Hill for some time.;,past, the considerable improvements which have taken place in this locality will be j moßt noticeable, not only has the thick bush ; givpn place to well cultivated fields, but comfortable homesteads, and pretty villa-like resideac££ ere to be seen in all directions, and we may here safe}/ lay it down that the , country residences are as sure an indication :of the prosperity or otherwise of the owner as the unhewn wood, the native bush, is of the wealth and capabilities of the soil upon whioh it stands, and even as in the finest forest a compartatively useless tree is occasionally met with, to in the midst of comfortable homesteads each declaring its owner to be well to do, we often come across a habitation which "contrasts painfully with those around it ; and regarding the owner of which, we may say his life has been a comparatively useless one. After passing Bell Grove, with its railway station lying in idleness, prepumably because the business capacity of the Minister for Public Works leads that gentleman to allow public property to deoay unused rather than be worn out by traffic, for there is no doubt whatever that the extension to Bell Grove would ba one of the best paying pieces of line in the Coloay, were the rails laid and traffic opened, Having passed tbje small monument of ioffioial incapacity, the coach shortly begins to mount Spooner's Range. , The gradient up the hills is not a bad one, and the road altogether is a grand improvement on the old 'ones, we use the plural because the present is the third attempt to get a good line to the summit, and really if horses are imbued with knowledge, as well as sense, they mußt mentally thank Mr Thompson, the Surveyor who laid out the present line upon each oooasion that they ascend this hill. By an unfortunate division of districts the summit of the range was made the dividing lino between those of the' Wiiimea Eoad Board and the Upper Motueka Valley, the consequence being that each Board has felt it neoessary to carry a road to the summit, whereas had a slight modification of Mr Roohfort's railway line been taken for the road it need not have gone so high as it does by a very considerable ascent;' indeed, we have professional authority for saying that the road might have been carried three hundred feet lower, and then the descent into N orris' Gully could have been made a very respectable one. The new road from the summit, which was constructed on the, advooaoy of Mr Oliver, and which leads towards the Tadtnor, is but little used, whilst all the CentrV. Buller traffio goes by *,he old road. Having descended into Norris' Gully the road ib a very indifferent one, but as a new, road is being oonstructpd there, it is to be.hoped that yery shorty passengers will be able to,get through fhis dreary gully in less time than is yet possible. About the first building that one passes after prpssing the range is,a flax mill, and notwithstanding the drawback of having to traverse a long hilly road before the produce can be delivered even at a | railwayetation, Mr Coleman, the proprietor, appears determined that it shall not be want of energy that shall prevent Motueka Valley competing with places where a market is more available. A little below- this mill we come: to the junction of the Motueka and Motupiko rivers, and the Buller road crosses just above the* meeting of the two streams, which are easily crossed, except in flood time, ffhen the Motupiko especially is dangerous on account of the rapid current. On either Bide of-the foi'd<is an<accommodation house, on the right bank is Mr Bromell'a, and on the left . Mrß' Hopgood's, and at the latter the coach stays sufficiently long, to reßt and bait the horses, at the same time giving an opportunity to traveller* to partake of an eayly dinner, and as this is the only place where the first day's journey, of twelve hours duration, is broken, refreshment is almost a necessity.. Nothing Ipfcb, we wpre pace more underway, and as the road runs for several miles up the Motupiko; Valley, the improvements which h»W wen effected there are plainly discernable. .With few exceptions all the settlers here appear to be prosperous, the houses are not without prekention, and there is n comfortable well to do aspeot about the homesteads, which cannot fail to impress ooe. Of course there are one or twoexceptions to prosperity; and j conspicuously stands, a somewhat delapidated hovel in one plaoe with its surroundings of blackened stumps and partially charred and' unoleared trees, and when it is said that a competent carpenter has reared a faaaily in such a place it cannot but be imagined that instead of energy a deplorable ripe has had the mattery there, ■In journeying along this . fertile valley in calm Spring time one could sosrcely believe that the almost insignifioant' stream'which is oontinually in view can ever b{ a source of danger, but tht widtriverbed .-, •'■■''!'*■ .■• ..'".■■ ' - ■■■"•■■' - : r-i..'-"-■'- i****-

and the tremendous slips where it ifting beneath the hills tells a story of flood and damage whioh is painful to contemplate on'So genial" f a^md>iiirtg.i£ Unfortunately for |he> travellers! ttie" (best portionof the road to the' BulleT endsilong before one gets out of the Motupiko Talley, and this is the more lamentable that for the money which mu§t have been expended a capital road, might have been,, further continued.4 ThVlooal Road BoaVd evidently does not, understand how to cut its cloth according to ' its means. We have already referred to the new road down from Spooler's" Rarigej the expenditureuponwhich seems almost to have.heen thrown away;. and flow in the upper' part of the Motupiko V alley instead of forming' and metalling a roadway say 15 feet in width, fhey have formed a road fully half a chain wide. True, it seems to have -been nicely formed, but having gone so far they appear to have been Btuck up for metal (short of coin, apparently), notwithstanding,.the.fapt, that, gravel may be seen in almost every direction. Tbe consequence of cour»e is that, with rich fertile soil, the drays and other vehioles sink to their axles, and the pulling tdget through this mud is something abominable. Having passed the accommodation house of Mr Trowur, whioh in appearance is a 'considerable improvement upon the house at which we had stayed, we still toiled onwards; and just before leaving the Valley we pass -on-our left the-accommodation house of Mr Newport, and we can safely recommend travellers on horseback to take the trouble to cross the... river, and make a call at this "hostelry," where the inner wants of both man and horse are attended to with a heartiness too seldom met with. However, we have plenty of mud before us, and toiling onwards the coaob ultimately passes over, through, round, and along tbe Motupiko banks, and we find ourselves in the valley of the Clark river, At. the lower part of; the valley, where there is some extent of level land, there are some clearings ; and although it was impossible not to admire the persevering energy of one settler, whose boundary is the roadway,- we could but wonder at hiß genius. This mau had found it expedient to fence his land in order to prevent his stock roaming, and so far his intention was right, but his fence was most unique. Having fallen, tbp burnt bush our friend had rolled huge' tronfes pf,sreeg to the boundary, and there tiftd erected a sort of three.-railed fence, the rails being trunks of trees/ which were supported by being balanced on shorter logs. The fence was a marvel of skill in the way of lifting, rolling, and handling logs of,wood, but as a fence we should prefer a post and rail of the ordinary construction, from an economical point of view, both as regards cost and, permanency too. The Clark Valley is without doubt the most dreary portion of the road, a narrow valley with narrow roadway, formed of play 5 beneath you on the right is bush, with a stieam eomewbere among the trees; and beyond that, tree-covered hills ; whijst on . the left tbe trees shut out our proapeot. There is little diversity in the bush even, for nearly all of it is birch,' though by keeping your eyeß open you can see a few pines here and there, slightly relieving the monotony; but still it is a long wearisome valley—" 'tis so," as' our friend the coachman would say. Uultimately, however, we come to the head of the Valley, and are crossing the Hope Saddle.' Looking behind ua from the summit we haye no such prospect as that which is «pread jjefqre one when on top of cjpooner's Range, Therp tlje Waimea P-laitiSj the Bay, picturesque bills on either side, with Gordon's knob, a hoary pate, and other snow capped mountains, makes the scene as beautiful as one could wish to see; but from tbe Hope, looking • a let. Lot's "wife, there is nothing but hills, all bush clad; bub on the other side the prospect, relieved by snow crowned ranges, is a delicious contrast from what we had been experiencing. Shortly, however,: our admiration for the beautiful gave way to admiration of the skill whioh was being displayed by our knight of the ribbons.' Whi^t opserying that with a little ingenuity the road over the saddle might hav"e .spared some of its ascending and descending sinuosities, we found that tbe leaders were pushing downhill headlong to the brink of a preoipiue, or, at all events, a slope so steep that it might just as well have been perpeh-. djoular, and \\ \yas with, somelittlerelief that just as th(3.leader£j fegt ware qn the. b,rxak and we had beopme conyinced, that tb,e roaa had slipped out, our dexterous coachman hacf his leaders swerving round at right angles,' and the wheels of the coach having barely missed looking, we found ourselves round the corner. After two or three similar bends had been got by with safety,1 a feeling that one jfligbj: trust oneself anywhere with such, a charioteer yas. jrresjstible, and the calm... enabled us to view the prospect. Down below us to. the left appeared a rather extensive bush covered plain, seemingly wajlecl in by hills, and we wereinformed Jliat here /wild, cattle had their home, and to all appearances there seemed; little chance of their being molested in such a plage, Obser-? yation pf.tbis haunt of tbe wild cattle was scarcely thought about, however, befpre W9 were upon another bend compared thpse we had previously rounded appeared as nothing, and the exolamationof the driver, • v this, is the Greoian bend" elioited no response till it |iWas passed, for a knowledge of Grecian bends: or any other mundane matter appeared of the least importance just then. ■ In a short space of time one becomes accustomed to these curves, and really there is something exhilerating in being driven at a good paoe on such a road. Having descended the saddle, we are in the *f Hope.'' ".' ' f'": ■ (Tcffaoantinfiedinour. next.) '