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APPENDIX 13. LEWIS PASS ROAI).—A SHORT DESCRIPTIVE ACCOUNT. Brief Description. The road over the Lewis Pass shortens the distance from Christchurch to many places on the west coast compared with distances by way of the older Arthur Pass route. The chief gains are : To Reefton, 35 miles ; Westport, 36 miles ; Murchison, 64 miles ; Nelson, 64 miles. The head of the Pass is 120 miles from Christchurch and 41J miles from Reefton. It is one of the lowest passes in the Southern Alps. The road was officially opened for traffic on the 30th October, 1937, by the Hon. R. Semple, Minister of Public Works. Early History. The Pass appears to have been used in the later wars among the Maori tribes up till about one hundred and twenty years ago. According to the historian Mr. James Cowan, the hot mineral waters of Maruia Springs, in the valley of the upper mountain route between the east and west coasts, were well known to the ancient Maori tribes on both sides of the Island. The Maruia route made a convenient, if hazardous, highway for warriors and parties carrying greenstone. It was the bartering expeditions which led to war expeditions, and Cannibal Gorge, Kope-o-Kai-Tangata, appears to have derived its name from repeated acts of cannibalism carried out in its gloomy recesses. The precious pounamu stone was the chief cause of these Maori hostilities, but it is also said that the pursuit of wekas and eel-fishing at the head of the rivers of the Maruia led to many fights. The Ngati-Tumataroriri, an ancient tribe of the Buller and Nelson country, appears to have disputed the possession of the Maruia Valley and the surrounding country with the Ngai-Tahu from Kaiapoi and Kaikoura. The Maruia Valley was a land of plenty, as the meaning of its name implies. The old Maoris found bird-life of all kinds —kakapo, the ground parrot, wekas or woodhens, kokako or native crows, and paradise duck. Some of these have vanished with the years, but many arc appearing again. Ancient Maori folk-lore of the Maruia tells of a huge predatory bird which, it was declared, was large enough to carry off human beings from the ground to its den or lair amid the heights of Cannibal Gorge. After the Maoris, many of the men who went to the West Coast in the days of the gold rushes used this route, and later a bridle-track was formed, known as the Rolleston Track. The completion of the new metalled highway over the Pass will make commonplace a crossing of the range that in the past was full of adventure. In the height of the gold-digging days hundreds of miners accompanied by strings of pack-horses made a precarious way from Canterbury over the Pass to the goldfields. The needs of the miningcamps also led to mobs of cattle being driven over by this route. The sons of the late Mr. George Rutherford, it is stated, used to drive fat stock from their station on the Canterbury side of the Pass to the diggings. Mr. Graham Flowers, now of the Accommodation House, Lake Rotoroa, who was one of the pioneer dealers of the eighties, also frequently took cattle through this route to the coast. Early French Settlers. The most romantic story about the mountain country traversed by the Lewis Pass Road concerns the band of French settlers who reputedly in the early sixties established themselves on the Hats and undulating hills high up near the junction of the Lewis and Boyle Rivers, in what is known as the Magdalen Valley. They called their settlement St. Andrews, and with great industry cultivated their alpine pastures. In the valley they depastured herds of beef cattle and milch cows, and, it is said, installed a cheese-making plant. Periodically, but at long intervals, they packed their cheese over the Lewis Pass Track to the gold-diggings, selling it to the miners, and returning loaded up with stores. They also drove fat cattle across to the diggings. These French settlers survived several years of hardship in country where every winter the snow lay deep on their pastures. Then, one year they visited the diggings for the last time with a consignment of cheese and cattle. They were not heard of again on the diggings, and the only remaining signs of their occupation are the crumbling walls of their sod and stone huts, and some of the gorse hedges. Part of one of their homesteads is now used as a musterer's hut on Glenhope Station. Description op Route. The Lewis Pass Road proper may be said to begin on the Christchurch-Hannier Road, at a point about half a mile south of the Waiau Bridge. En route to Lewis Pass we turn north-west at this point, cross a terrace, and drop down alongside the Waiau River itself. The road follows closely along the right-hand bank of the river for some distance, being protected at one or two points by a system of groynes which have been found necessary to protect the road from river erosion. The country along this stretch is not particularly interesting, and the road passes over several small creeks by open ford. The first bridge we cross is at Handysides Creek, and shortly after this the road takes a fairly sharp rise, to pass over what is known as Boundary Creek. The view from here, looking back down the Waiau River and across the Hanmer Plantations, is, in the afternoon light with a sinking sun, very attractive, particularly in the autumn, when the larch plantations are changing their foliage colouring. The country here, on either side of the river, is pastoral, and in some cases the menace of shingle slides is very apparent.

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