After the glorious sunset from the night before and a bright nearly full moon that beamed a shaft of light into our lovely studio Airbnb (Okari Cottage), the day dawned beautifully, without a cloud in the sky. Temps were in the mid-to-high 50s to begin the day but got up to over 70 in the afternoon as the bright sun warmed everything up.

We had a note from Jude, our hostess, to say that she had to go out but would be back at 10:30am if we wanted to get the bikes and helmets from her. So we decided to stay local to get that done. We drove to the far (southern) end of Okari Road to see if there was beach access down there (about 2 miles), but we found none. We returned to the north end and found a way to our beach. We were also looking for penguins – Jude thinks the chicks are likely still in their nests. They fledge between October and December. No luck on that score, though!

We got the bikes from Jude – what a lovely woman. She is getting ready to move into the mobile home down the hill directly in front of us. She apparently has 3 properties – her lovely home to the east of us, our Airbnb unit, and the mobile home in front of us (to the West). She has run a milkshake/ice cream/soft drink stall (a trailer) at the parking lot for the Seal Colony for the past 20 years and is eager to have her daughter (who lives in Christchurch) come and run the stand for the summer. Jude will have her hands full with her grandkids!

Once we got the bikes sorted, we made some sandwiches with the left-over salmon from “High Country Salmon”, threw in some of the cheese from Barry’s Bay, and some other little things, and made the drive out to Denniston – about 15 miles north of Westport.

Denniston Mine

The climb up the hill to the mine site, about 2,000 feet, was slow but spectacular. We got to the top and pulled into the parking lot and, as chance would have it, directly in front of us were 3 picnic tables. There were 3 people just finishing their lunch. As they packed up we chatted. They were from Wanaka and were visiting the area for the first time. They’d enjoyed an Alaska cruise the year before, followed by a driving tour from Oregon down to San Francisco. We discussed (of course) the horrible election result – everyone thinks the U.S. has gone completely insane.

We enjoyed our lunch and the absolutely spectacular view out over the narrow plain that stretched from the foot of the mountain to the sea (looks about like 2-3 miles). Really lovely. Then we toured the mine exhibits and ruins. Amazingly, there was still mining going on in the region until the 1970s or 1980s (the mining began in the 1870s), but there is almost nothing but foundations remaining from the many buildings that were active on the site. At one point, the Denniston mine was the largest in New Zealand, and the town at the top of the hill (aka ‘the plateau’) had over 3,000 residents. There was a post office, police station, school, etc.

The view from 'the plateau' at Denniston

"The Incline - 8th Wonder of the World"

There were several coal mines in the area that fed their output to “the incline” – an incredibly steep railway that lowered cars containing tons of coal to the bottom of the hill, where the coal was transferred to trains bound for Westport, and from there onto coal ships for distribution around New Zealand and for export. The incline resembles a roller coaster, or perhaps an Olympic ski jump. The cars were controlled by brakemen (a hugely responsible and challenging job) using hydraulic breaks. The weight of empty coal cars hauled back up the mountain acts to offset the weight of the descending full cars. Accidents happened, however, and working around the incline was hazardous. One comment on an exhibit said that "the only time there was no danger around the incline was when it wasn’t working." The completion of this project was an engineering feat in the 1880s. Some referred to it as “the 8^th wonder of the world.

Fortunately, the coal being mined was of very high quality ideal for making coke that is used for steel and iron. Also, there was very little gas in the seams. As a result, there were no major mining disasters on the site, and deaths were largely accidental and one-off things (including one miner committing suicide in the mine).

One of the books Munroe picked up in Kerikeri (north of Opua) was one by Jenny Pattrick called “The Denniston Rose” – about a little girl coming to live with her mother and reprobate father in Denniston in the 1880s. It gives you a great deal of insight into the hard lives of miners and their families at the outset of mining in the area.

We picked up Pattrick’s sequel to the novel, “Heart of Coal," at a bookstore in Westport and Deb is reading it now. The pictures at the exhibit suggest that conditions improved in the 1900s for the community with real houses, etc. Deb has finished the first book and is reading the second now - Munroe is reading The Denniston Rose now and loving it.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time at the site, walked around the full extent of it, and read every one of the many excellent interpretative panels. New Zealand really does a beautiful job with its heritage sites.

Bike Ride from Okari Cottage
We stopped at the grocery store (New World) in Westport to get a couple supplies and then returned to our place to have a cup of tea around 4pm. Then we got the bikes out and had an amazing ride down the coast to the bay that leads to the Seal Colony. There is a wonderful gravel track that runs beside the road and it is fun and safe to ride on. We spoke with two different couples – a pair of women giving their little dog a run and letting him chase a stick thrown into a sheltered bit of water. They were lovely, and then we happened upon a guy and his son (or maybe grandson, more likely) – they were trying to feed eels under a bridge. Just lovely people, eager to engage with us and to have us enjoy our stay in New Zealand. The older guy had been a founding member of a surf club at the beach and he said they have their national surf championship there every year. He was building a new home and was living in their Airbnb place while doing so – and encouraged us to stay there when we returned!