Eastern Bays of Banks Peninsula Offer Ideal Holiday Ground.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18946, 17 December 1929, Page 19 (Supplement)

Eastern Bays of Banks Peninsula Offer Ideal Holiday Ground.

Go On Foot; Admire The Beauty of The Country; And Take A Camera.

(By

W. A. Taylor).

THE majority of persons rarely consider a place suitable for a holiday unless it is at least a hundred miles from home. Christchurch residents usually make for some spot north of the Conway River or south of the Waitaki River. Less hackneyed than Geraldine, Peel Forest, Bealey or Kaikoura, are the Eastern Bays of Banks Peninsula. Singly or collectively the bays offer much in the way of a splendid fortnight’s holiday. Thirty years ago Banks Peninsula drew heavily on holiday traffic. Not so to-day; few persons now patronise the country of cocksfoot and cheese. From Lyttelton twice weekly the steamers John Anderson and Orewa call at the Bays. A motor service daily from Akaroa at £1 per passenger does the round of the bays, and for a correspondingly smaller fare, shorter journeys from one bay to another. The steamer fare is much about the same as the motor fare, and this method of transit is usually preferred by residents, who, unlike the visitors, are not concerned with viewing a change of scenery.

To the healthy person of either sex, > good old “Shanks’s pony" is hard to t beat as a means of transport. You : have time to linger and admire the ' undoubted beauty of the Peninsula, , with its panoramic-views of hills, bush l and sea continually opening to the • view. The New Brighton Boy Scouts l several years ago made the round of , the Eastern Bays, carrying their heavy gear in a trundling barrow, demon- • strating to after-comers the practic- ; ability of hiking the Peninsula. Nowadays there are no public boar<diii iiiiHsiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiittmmmiiinnniiiiimiiimiiiiiiiiiiimiiummfiimiiimHmmi

ing houses in the Bays, but a reply-paid query to the local .storekeeper or postmaster will put you in the way of an obliging farmer who will billet you for a few days, and 6s a day is pot usually a bit too much for the courtesy extended to you.

A change of clothing and a few small accessories in your kit ate all that you require—the majority of women folk take usually far too much baggage. One item that should never be left at home is the camera. With its companionship a holiday is given added interest, and records are secured which become more valuable as the years roll by.

'Though the easiest way to visit the Bays is by motor-car the tramper has the better time, should the weather be at all favourable. Care should be taken that the footwear is neither too new, nor too old, and boots should be substantially soled and heeled, " as on the proper care of the feet depends the success of the tramper’s holiday.

Pigeon Bay will be considered as the first stage of the journey. You travel on the Akaroa service coach to the Hill Top, then walk along the Banks Peninsula Summit Road to the Pigeon Bay Saddle, skirting the bush slopes of Rocky Hill, passing the termination of the Purau Trail (Mr Ell’s future Summit Road above Barry’s Bay and historic Onawe Peninsula), on past the old Pigeon Bay Road, with its obliterated sign-post, to the present road and down hill to the rendezvous for the next few days, you having arranged board by letter at the various stages beforehand. Pigeon Bay offers many pleasant walks, just sufficient to keep one in trim for the next stage of the journey, namely Little Akaloa. When at Pigeon Bay, fail not to visit Holmes’s Bay, which really is another arm. This bay was formerly known as Sinclair’s, after its original occupants, a family well known to the students of the early history of Canterbury. At Holmes’s

Hay are to be found relics of sawmilling days . . . The road at Holmes’s Bay leads over to Port Levy, across \\ ild Cattle Hill. Having spent the time allotted for Pigeon Bay, you tramp back up hill to the Summit Road, along it for a mile or so, and down, and your ioumey s second stage is reached. Little Akaloa 1 has a splendid, safe bathing beach, and j in midsummer you. can enjoy many a good old splash. The Anglican Church at this bav claims attention by its quaint architecture, its walls being made of ironsand and paua shell, which glisten in the sunshine. When here, try also as at Pigeon Bay. a few gentle walks, such as going to Decanter Bay on the north side, and the Panau on the south side. The Panau was the scene of Maori warfare, and it is .sometimes known by its European name of Long Look Out Point (it can be seen from New Brighton beach). When the scheduled time is up at Little Akaloa, the journey continues to Okain's Bay, the third stage. En route you pass through Chorlton Village above Raupo Bay. Up and down hill the road goes, past Stony Bay, and at last from Stony Hill you view the largest of the bays, Okain's. This is a bay of great interest historically, for it was at Little Okain’s that Mold, the great Ngatahu chief, first landed in Canterbury to vanquish the Ngati Mamoe tribe. The bay appears bleak to-day, residents having cut the timber out at a prodigious rate. After a couple of days spent at Okain’s, journey up the valley and down again through the valley of Le Bon’s Bay. With picturesque surroundings, pleasant trips over the hills to Waikerakikari Bay, or to Laverick’s Bay, the fortnight’s holiday draws toa close at Le Bon’s Bay. The motor ! service is availed of to Akaroa, whence j you journey home, well satisfied with 1 the past fortnight’s entertainment.