Reefton

And then the rain began - not just light drizzle or the occasional downpour - real rain.  Thankfully, it stopped on our way through Lewis Pass - a brief respite.  And here was one of those unexpected highlights -  a walk around the alpine plants.  WOW is all we could say as we walked around this summer alpine wonderland.  I have talked to lots of people about this, and those who regularly go through to the West Coast have never stopped here.

Further down the road we enjoyed another soak in hot pools - Maruia Springs. These springs are the centre of a Japanese style restaurant and accommodation.  You could buy sushi and miso soup and bathe in the Japanese bath house or outdoors.  We didn't have the food - after all we had another picnic ready to have in the car.  It was one of those places that was great at the time, but when you get out of the warm water it feels very cold and you lose that relaxing feeling when you have to run through rain and avoid puddles!!

We had another little stop just before Reefton to walk across a swing bridge.  One of those places where we could have gone for a longer walk if we had time - a bit of regret there.

Well, what's to say about Reefton - what a great little place.  We found our digs quite quickly (an old nurses home off the main street) after all there aren't too many streets in Reefton.  We wandered along the main street (quite busy as the races had just finished on NZ's smallest race course), taking photos (particularly of the Reef Cottage Bed and Breakfast that has been advertised as 'enchanting' and 'charmingly renovated' (pity we couldn't go inside) and found a restaurant where we could shelter under a corrugated iron roof and behind some fairly heavy plastic curtains.  We found a book to read 'Land Of The Long Wild Road' which was a rather humorous story about two English motor cyclists travelling around New Zealand' which we read together between courses, and stayed so long that the owner put the light on for us and we decided to have dessert.  It must have been good as it kept Harry enthralled - which doesn't happen often unless there are aeroplanes or cars in it.  

The next day (did I mention it was raining) we went to Waiuta (Blackwater in Maori) - a derelict mining town.  Within its forest setting we wandered around mining relics all that remains from a once busy miners town.  Its a ghost town a remnant of the gold mining past of this area.  In 1905 a gold reef was found and within weeks people had arrived to be part of the history of mining gold.  Mining underground in the 1920' and it was one of the few mining towns to  celebrate its 25th year.  There were lots of photos of what the town was like, busy with family life eg 600 people needed a hospital, school, post office, churches, swimming pool, bowling green, library, hotel, clubs and police station and of course shops.   In 1951 there was still plenty of gold but the ventilation shaft and pumping station collapsed and very soon the mine was filled with water and poisonous gases.  The town was built on mining, and with no second industry it very soon became a ghost town, buildings were deconstructed and removed, machinery taken down the windy road to another mine. People left a thriving town to return to nature.

Then it was onto Blackball and past the sobering entrance to the Pike Mine where 29 miners still lie.  Blackball is a very little town that survived the loss of its coal mine.  It has a history of radicalism and militancy being the birthplace of the Labour Party and the miners strike in the early 1900's which lasted ten weeks.  In 1925 the headquarters of the NZ Communist Party moved to Blackball from Wellington.  The hotel the former Blackball Hilton was a great place to have a coffee - we looked at the old photos and the building of the stage for the New Years Celebrations - we should have booked the night in Blackball - a bit more going on than in Greymouth.