Day 7 Wanganui river
road mail run
The day started early with myself getting up around 630am. I
am still getting used to the early starts and NZ being two hours ahead of
Australia. I think I am getting used to it though and I did have food to eat
for breaky. I had bought muesli bars the day before from Countdown and a pork
pie for lunch. The van arrived at the time he told me to wait for him. The tour
is actually done by the local postie whose job is to deliver the mail to the
small communities out on the River Road to Piprki as the whole area is very isolated
and there is only one road on one side of the river. A sign lets you know if
the road is open at certain parts. The postie delivers to some unique mail
boxes. Several are old fridges and there was one microwave that was a box. He
does not even have to leave the vehicle in some places at all, just lean out
the window. People get him to do stuff for him like will call him to deliver
cigarettes or even some fuel. They are pretty trusting and you would not want
to get on their bad side. They do pay for the stuff too. NZ is looking at
totally banning cigarettes by around 2025.
The original road for this area was actually the river as
the Wanganui river was used to bring supplies to the towns that did not have a
road. The road did not appear until around the 1930’s and this bought about the
decline of the river traffic for trade. Many of the homes are accessible by
road, but the ones, which are not have a cable car to reach them from the other
side of the river. One along the road is actually a resort owned by the mayor
of Wanganui. Her husband manages it while she has a town house to work out of
during the week. There is only one school along the road and this only services
the primary school and the secondary schoolies are actually sent to boarding
schools. Many of the people n the area are related and have the same names so
it might be hard if you do not know the area to who lives where. In New Zealand
the farms have a unique numbering system. The numbers for example 1968 is
actually 19kms point 68 from the nearest town. I can be wrong if it is the
biggest town like Wanganui or one of the other towns.
I was actually the only one on the trip for that day and it
was explained that it is usually quiet at this time of year. This was the
reason I was not able to go on the jet boat to the bridge to nowhere. He wasn’t
going to wait for one person. It is understandable and I was not very worried
at all. I did have the front seat and I was shown some unique sites like the
Flour Mill which is a historic site that has been rebuilt. This was one of four
in the area and was reconstructed during the 1980s. Along the road there are
fossils of the ocean floor with oyster beds poking out of the rock wall just
above the road. Amazing to look at and interesting that something like this is
actually there. Another is the original river bed, which was diverted when
several hundreds of years ago a volcano erupted and changed the river flow to
its present path. Closeby is actually a building with the year 1980 written on
the side and these were flood levels of that year. The river can rise rapidly
with rain from any part.
The townships are pretty unique as many were missionaries
located along the river. The names of the towns have English and Maori names. I
think this is another way to recognise them. There are the towns of Athens,
London and even Jerusalem. I can say I have been there for lunch now as I had
morning tea of muffins and coffee in Jerusalem. This place is where the Sisters
of Compassion live and no they do not wear habits. I have already asked one of
them. One of the buildings they are doing up for backpackers and others who are traveling in the area. Everyone needs a little bit of cash to do up their
buildings and maybe modernise. They do have a church on the grounds too and it
did look really nice once I walked in and had a look. I did notice two birds
fighting on the roof of the church. They slid all the way down and landed on
the ground while still fighting. I thought they were hurt until they both got up
and flew off. The town of Pipriki was not as big as I thought it would be and
was the last leg of the run for the postie. This was where the jet boat tour
for the bridge to nowhere started. At this moment in time it was very quiet as
everyone was waiting for summer to come out and enjoy the sun. There is also a
ranger station out there too that will keep an eye on everyone. I did not see
any hostel type places other than camping grounds being offered. There are
several farms that are actually corporations owned by the maori and they run
cattle and sheep amongst other things they do on the stations.
We stopped at one of the local Marae with a Tui bird pained
on it. The postie was told that he was not allowed to being his dog out as his
wife sometimes did the tour. This was our lunch stop and on the way back to
town. The Marea had its own Anglican church as well and I took some pictures of
the area and put some coins in as a donation to thank them. When asked if he
did the weekends other than the week days when he went out on his run, it was
explained to me that he would only take a minimum of 3 people to make it worth
his while. This would pay for the fuel. There is talk of making the rural
posties only work 3 days a week instead of 5 as there are not many letters
being posted anymore, but there is an increase in parcels being ordered over
the internet. Something that is pretty new to the area is a cycle track that
has opened in the last few years. Part of the road has signs to say that there
are bikes around. It is not very popular yet, but they are hoping that it would
be. Employment in Wanganui is not that good for the young people as there is
not much for them to do. There are people who go work in the mines and fly back
to the NZ on their time off. Could work and could be a little crazy too.
What was left of the afternoon was spent with my realisation
that the Hobbit coins had been released and I wanted to buy some and to find
out how much they actually cost. Regardless I was going to price them and I
knew they would be there at a post office. I wandered to where I knew a post
office would be and did find a little booklet with the price of the coins and
also Hobbit stamps. I wanted them also and bought them. I asked the post lady
where I could get some she directed me towards the post collectable store that
looked like a huge mail sorting centre. I wandered towards that place across
the road from the police station. Before I crossed the road, I was distracted
by a sign above a door to a building. Seems there is a bag piping group
association in the town, nice to know I hope. I went into the post collectables
shop and they told me the coins would be another two weeks away and she doesn’t
know about them. I said thanks and wandered to a nearby park, thinking I should
call the lady out on the Bullshit. Why do i know it is crap? I read the
newspaper article that the coins would be out on the 1st of November.
I will ask in Wellington and grill Weta too, the mystery is yet to be solved.
The rest of the time I spent wandering and wandered around a
park that housed the local archives, museum and art gallery. I cant remember
the name at the moment. I was divided about walking into the library and
archive centre thinking they would be closed. I did a lap, where I did go back
and observe the sign that said the building was not earthquake compliant. I was
lucky they were open as I had 15 mins left before it closed. I asked about the
person I was after and I jackpotted. They had a brief outline on William Hogg
Watt’s life and the location of the headstone. The headstone was a later
addition and he died bankrupt through the depression around the 1890s. He had
several children and I am going back tomorrow for more research. The museum is
said to have quite a bit of info too. This place requires my undivided
attention for further research and maybe an article or two. Wanganui is the
sister town to Toowoomba, not that I said bad things about the town. I was really
nice and said it was nearby, several hours away in fact. The same area had
another WW1 monument and I noticed something, the Dury Hill Monument seemed
like they both lined up or were nearly in line with a clear view of both.
After my find, the Velodrome and the observatory were my
next stop. I found another boar war memorial in the park and it was called Cook
gardens. The area had a running track and very good acoustics as I could hear
the bloke yelling at the people training very clearly. You are not allowed to
smoke, have dogs, soft drinks etc at this park. I was wondering what the tower
was at the top of the hill and found this was the original fire bell. There
were four of them and had been placed when the town had first been settled. On
one side of the park was an opera house and on the other end were the council
buildings / chambers. I might go there and explain myself if I have time. Across
the road was a church that had a monument I had read about earlier about the
associate of William Watt. The child of Taylor had died after being dropped and
downed. I will read more on this later. I was hungry so jumped into the local
Irish pub that I soon found had an early photo of William Hogg Watt monument /
memorial fountain. I thought it was neat and then back home where I had a load
of washing and I was jokingly called a cheapskate for only doing a cold wash
with detergent. I was asked about my bag and I said no it shrunk the last time
I washed it.
Tip
The best way of exploring a town is just to wander and see
what you find. Sometimes you will find something that may not be on the map.
Make sure you know your way back to where you are staying too or else you would
be lost. Night can be very different and turn you around.
Highlight
Having the lady in the library and archive centre tell me
that the borrowing library was next door. I don’t know if I was to be insulted
or not, but maybe it was what I was wearing. I soon set the lady straight by
explaining what I was after and sat to read the info. Looks can be deceiving
and people should stop doing that with me. Happen too often.
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