NEW TOURIST ROUTE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19807, 24 May 1934, Page 11

NEW TOURIST ROUTE

STUDHOLME JUNCTION TO QUEENSTOWN SAVING IN TIME EFFECTED A new tourist route which will effect a saving ill time of a full day on the journey from the North Island to Queenstown will be opened up to-day. This progressive move has been made by the Mount Cook Tourist Company, which has completed arrangements for a special bus service to connect with the main trunk expresses at Studholme Junction and to run via Waimate, the Waitaki River, Kurow, and the Lindis Pass to Cromwell, where the Company’s existing service to Queenstown will be connected with. The new route will mean that tourists who left Wellington last evening will be able to be In Queenstown to-night, saving them the long journey to Dunedin, where they were formerly forced to spend a night before proceeding to Queenstown. New Country Opened Up. Apart from the convenience of the service, the new route will open up country which has not previously been available to the ordinary through tourist. From Studholme Junction, the traveller will be taken through Waimate and along the Waitaki River to the Waitaki Hydro Electric Works, which will be one of the features of the trip. From there the road runs through some of the finest country in Central Otago, over the famous Lindis Pass (3400 ft) and down through the gold mining area to Cromwell. There a change will be made to the Company s usual service cars which operate between Cromwell and Queenstown, which takes the tourist over the Crown Range and the Kawarau Gorge. The new route also makes possible a round tour, returning via Cromwell and Dunedin. The service will be inaugurated today, and It is the Company’s intention to operate it this winter as long as road conditions permit, resuming it again next spring. It is expected that next season round trips to the Hermitage will be made, the new route offering an alternative return journey from Omarama to Studholme Junction.