Golden Bay’s latest walkway secures public access to Lake Otuhie on the west coast
The new Lake Otuhie Walkway secures public access to the 5km-long dune lake. Photo: Gerard Hindmarsh.
What has been, to date, confusing riparian access to Lake Otuhie has now been cleared up by the formal creation of the Lake Otuhie Walkway on the Bay’s west coast.
The start of the orange triangle-marked track has now been signposted (with an information board) along Cowin Road between Paturau and the Anatori, immediately after the road gate on the bridge that crosses Sandhills Creek.
The track takes around 30 minutes to get to the outlet of the five-kilometre-long dune lake and another 15 minutes to reach a particularly pretty white-sand beach that protrudes to provide the perfect picnic stop. Rather than any sort of formed pathway, the walkway instead follows sheep tracks as it picks its way alongside the creek, with one necessary knee-deep crossing. The last part, which runs beneath the limestone bluffs, requires some concentrated footwork as it picks its way along the grassy and scrubby terrain studded with small outcrops.
The formal legalisation of Golden Bay’s latest walkway was made possible only after the surrounding 348 hectares of land was purchased from the Cowin family by United States citizens William (Bill) and Rebecca Allen of the United States.
In their application to the Overseas Investment Commission for permission to buy the coastal block, granted in May 2005, the Allens proposed not only to restore the property to a fully productive capacity and establish an “Outreach Partnership Programme to provide experiential educational and recreational opportunities for teenagers in collaboration with existing community-minded youth programmes”, but to provide for the creation of a walkway (as defined by the Walkways Act 1990) in order to provide public access to Lake Otuhie.
The applicants also agreed at the time to enter into a conservation covenant under Section 77 of the Reserves Act 1977 to create a buffer zone to protect the margins of the lake adjoining the property and to improve riparian cover at the lake margins. They also agreed to work in conjunction with the Department of Conservation to implement the walkway and covenant. This area at the top of the walkway has now been fenced off. The Allens, who still only come out occasionally to stay, currently employ a manager to look after their farm. One stipulation is that the walkway will be closed for lambing between 1 August and 30 September, or when the fire danger is very high. Kayakers may use the creek adjacent to the walkway and Lake Otuhie.
The scrubby hinterland beyond Lake Otuhie, known as the Golden Blocks, was the scene of the most isolated goldfield of New Zealand’s history. The streams of this area, once just called Taitapu, gave up good alluvial gold, and by the mid 1880s several hundred men were working claims there. It wasn’t long before the big quartz gold reefs were discovered on the gnarly ridges beyond the lake. Roughneck miners working claims with names like Morning Star, Anthill and Golden Ridge congregated in two small settlements that became known as Dogtown and Pennyweight. No complete record remains of the gold earned from these remote mines, and the last mine closed in 1913, but one estimate puts earnings in excess of $20 million at today’s prices.
More notable was the immense labour needed to get the machinery to the sites. The first stamping battery for the Morning Star mine was shipped from Collingwood to the Anatori River, dragged along the coast by oxen to Sandhills Creek on tracks laid ahead and taken up behind as they went, then ferried up Lake Otuhie before being physically manhandled up steep gullies to their final working site. The much larger 200-ton Taitapu Battery, featuring 20 stamping heads with a crushing rate of 150 drops per minute, was rafted up Sandhills Creek to the head of Lake Otuhie atop huge logs. First though, a mighty dam had to be built at the mouth so the water would back up to the level of the lake. Once across the lake, the battery was pushed on tramway tracks by sheer manpower up to its final resting place one kilometre up Slatey Creek.
The new walkway ends before the hinterland and these sites are difficult to reach. Without local knowledge, the maze of overgrown tracks and old workings can be confusing.
Anyone interested in the area’s historical sites could look up Historic Gold Trails of Nelson and Marlborough by Tony Nolan (AH & AW Reed 1976), or for more in-depth information refer to the NZFS report History of Taitapu Estate by J Barnes. His site record forms (NZMS1) for each of the mines and workings are held both in the NZ Register of Archaelogical Sites and by DOC in Nelson.
Gerard Hindmarsh
