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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 10, Issue 9 (December 2, 1935)

A Fiordland Riding Trip— — Down the Lower Hollyford

A Fiordland Riding Trip—
Down the Lower Hollyford

During the summer months, scores of motor-cars will rush up and down the new Te Anau - Milford Sound road, and tourists by the hundred will go back to their homes, and talk of the rugged grandeur of the mountains, and the placid beauty of the lakes, as seen from the windows of closed-in motor-cars that have raced up and down the Eglinton and the Upper Hollyford Valleys in a one-day trip. Every one of them will have passed across the Divide, where the road turns one way into the Upper Hollyford and the Homer Valleys, and the other way into ' ?

Probably not one tripper in fifty, not even in a hundred, will know about that “other way.” A fair number will know that the track winding up the steep hillside on the other side of the valley leads to Howden Hut and Key Summit, but they won't know anything about the splendid trip that leads out into the hinterland of the Fiord country, over thirty miles down the great forests of the Lower Hollyford and out to Lake McKerrow and Martin's Bay, about twenty miles north of Milford Sound.

This is the trip we took last summer. It is a trip many will want to take, when they know something of its hidden beauties, and the exhilaration of a real gypsying ramble out into the Back o’ Beyond!

It was to be a riding trip this time. I had done the Milford Track, and the magnificent new Round Trip opened by Leslie Murrell from Manapouri to the West Coast Sounds. Now I wanted something on horseback by way of a change. So on a lovely morning in February, Jack Shaw of Elfin Bay arrived at Howden Hut with horses, and our party set off down the long, very rough and very rocky trail that leads through the bush into the Lower Hollyford Valley. This steep descent was the roughest portion of the old pack track, cut over fifty years ago, that was once the only means of communication between the pioneer settlers and gold miners at Martin's Bay, and the outside world. For that matter, it is still the only overland route into civilisation, but the Government steamer “Matai” makes regular calls at Martin's Bay nowadays, and the few remaining settlers receive their stores and mail by the sea route.

It was understood from the outset that this was to be leisurely gipsying, not a rush affair of M.P.H., or even M.P.G., but merely miles-per-slow-jog trot—a leisurely amble when the track degenerated into a bog, or lost itself altogether in the wilderness of fern and dense undergrowth, as it did quite frequently. So it was not surprising that after it had led us safely to the first crossing of the Hollyford River, it should desert us completely a little later, and leave us wandering round for an hour, looking for our first night's hostelry. It bore the simple yet significant name of Deadman's Hut, and contained three or four bunks, a candle stump, some chipped enamel mugs and a rusty billy, so with the aid of a judicious selection from thirty or forty pounds of stores, ample equipment and sleeping bags, a jolly time was had by all, and no complaints registered in the visitors’ book next morning.

Rowing up the Pyke River, Lower Hollyford.

Rowing up the Pyke River, Lower Hollyford.

Next day we rode mile after mile down the banks of the Hollyford, a swift river of blue and silver, full of peril after heavy rains and flooding, but presenting no problem at all this bright summer day. The track ran page 61 through a narrow canyon, a mere crack between the seven-thousand-feet-high rock walls of the Darran Range. Our next stop was Hidden Falls Hut, a much more pretentious affair than Deadman's with a verandah round three sides, and built in a most picturesque clearing on the banks of the river. We visited the Falls next morning a splendid mass of water that came roaring down a hundred-foot drop over a black wall of rock, with a twist somewhere up near the top that prevented the whole fall from being seen, save from a point directly opposite.

The deeper we penetrated into the Lower Hollyford, the more impressive grew the scenery, the more grand and rugged the country and higher the mountains, until they reached the pinnacle point of grandeur at the Pyke River. Here there opened out a stupendous panorama of bush, lake and river, unexcelled anywhere in Fiordland—indeed—in New Zealand. The Pyke flows out of Lake Alabaster, and winds a shining silver riband about the feet of the mountain gods, whose glory culminates in majestic Tutoko, over 9,000 feet in height, seen to perfection from the Pyke Hut. We found a boat a little way up the river, and went rowing next morning on Alabaster, a lovely lake that mirrored all the beauty of its matchless forest and mountain setting.

And because the Pyke is a deep, swift river, and because I had been told I would have to hang on to my horse's tail as it swam across, and because I didn't want to do any more riding for a day or two anyway, we crossed prosaically to the other side in a boat, and tramped the six or seven miles through the bush down to Lake McKerrow. Here we expected to find another boat, in which we could row the ten miles up the lake to Martin's Bay. But alas! the previous party from Martin's Bay had been caught in a true Fiordland flood which had wafted them almost to the doors of the McKerrow Hut, so that we, the first visitors after a lapse of two months, found the heavy boat high and dry on a shingle bank a quarter of a mile from the water!

So we turned back into the bush next morning with a good deal of regret, and retraced our steps to the Pyke. One does not like to fail in an objective—yet the thought of going back to finish the job is a tremendously strong incentive when the way lies through Fiordland!

But no return trip is ever quite like the first fine adventuring. There comes a haunting, rather wistful feeling, that the “next time” might find conditions changed. The Lower Hollyford is to be opened this summer for tourist parties. And with memories of that eight days leisurely ambling and rambling, the wandering along the old, broken corduroy track with only the music of the birds and song of the river to break the great Fiordland silence—well, one does not altogether relish the prospect of a line-up for the Hollyford crossings, nor priority bookings for bunks at Deadman's!

“The true function of food,” said the host, with a laugh, “is to prepare the palate for tobacco, so lunch being over suppose we adjourn for a whiff? I can't offer you a cigar—don't smoke them. But I can give you a pipe of the best—something to write home about!” The guest filled and lit up. Silence. Presently he said: “This baccy of yours is really fine, old man, what is it?” “N.Z. Cut Plug No. 10 (Bullshead),” replied the host, “thought you'd like it. There's nothing better—or so good—to my mind. And it's so harmless! It's toasted.” “What difference does that make?” enquired the guest. “All the difference, my boy. It extracts the nicotine from the tobacco and makes it as pure as rock crystal.” The guest (a “pommy”) eagerly noted the names of the five toasted brands: Navy Cut No. 3 (Bulldog), Cut Plug No. 10 (Bullshead), Cavendish, Riverhead Gold and Desert Gold—“for future reference,” as he said. “But have a care when buying,” counselled the host, “there are some rotten imitations about!” There are.*

Towering peaks of the Darran Range above the Lower Hollyford River and the rapids of Hidden Falls Creek.

Towering peaks of the Darran Range above the Lower Hollyford River and the rapids of Hidden Falls Creek.