Page:Rambles on the Golden Coast of New Zealand.djvu/101

Rh a long stretch of beach is reached, but the firm white sand will be found to have given place to loose gravelly shingle, along which no great speed can be made by the pedestrian, and yet, as he will learn from the ferryman, it will be needful to put his best foot forward. If wise he will not travel this stage alone. Before him he will see, some few miles ahead, the rough contour of rocks stretching far out into the breakers, and round these as well as others which he will see further on, it will be needful to clamber while the tide is out, or if by chance tarrying too long by the way, the only alternative will be a compulsory halt perched on some rocky eminence or among the flax and bushes on a hill-side until the inflowing tide has ebbed again. It is a good eight or ten hours’ journey for the average pedestrian from the Mohikinui to the Wanganui River, and the variations of the stage are these:—heavy walking on shingly beaches, clambering and jumping along masses of rocks and boulders, climbing steep cliffs, in one place only accomplished by aid of a pendant wire rope, many devious turnings through thick bush and fell, to make a way round the head of the many gullies which break the face of the hill, steep ascents and descents, trying to the mind and muscles; time only for briefest respite, for any symptom of prolonged halt will be greeted by admonition from the guide, “Push on, sir, push on, or you will be stuck up.” Not by bushrangers, for in truth travellers along this route are few and far between, and carry nothing that would make good plunder, but by time and tide which wait for no man. When the last steep declivity is reached, and the traveller finds himself emerging from a track narrow and overgrown with ferns, flax, and leafy foliages, he will, on fording a narrow rivulet, see cause for expeditious movements. An immense heap of broken rocks forms one of the jaws, if the term may be used, of the mouth of the Wanganui River. When the tide is in, the breakers dash against these rocks even in calm weather with a force that sends the spray very many feet high, and any one then attempting to get round the point does so at the imminent peril of his life; the river also becomes swollen by the tidal inflow, and although a ferryman lives on the opposite bank, he wisely forbears from venturing to cross in his canoe until the tide has well run out again. The Otahu mountain, up whose almost vertical sides the traveller will have climbed in his journey from the Mohikinui to avoid the dangers of the rugged shore, shows a granite formation, alternating with limestone cliffs, some of which, known to navigators as the Otahu Bluffs, reach an altitude of 700 to 800 ft., of nearly perpendicular faces to the surf foaming at their base, and presenting most striking features on the coastal scenery when viewed from seaward. For the information of geologists the following extract is taken from Julius Haast’s report of topographical and geological exploration, referring to the line of country just described:—“A mile north of the Ngakawau stream granite makes its appearance overlaid by tertiary deposits. It is here syenitic, and more towards the north trappean, changing in some places into felsite porphyry. In other places the mica is replaced by chlorite, and large veins of the same mineral are visible, intersecting the rock. We meet also with many porphyritic granites containing large orthoklas crystals, and with others containing albite in greater proportion. Some of the trappean