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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 9, Issue 10 (January 1, 1935)

The “Tea-Dinner” Road

The “Tea-Dinner” Road.

One of Preece's peace-time jobs was the construction of roads towards Whakatane and to Fort Galatea, on the Rangitaiki, the frontier post guarding the way to the Urewera country. Captain Turner, of Tauranga, afterwards a well-known resident of Rotorua, laid out the road lines, and Preece did the rest. At any rate a good deal of it. Just beyond Te Teko, as you motor towards Whakatane, the road crosses a long level, which was evidently once waterlogged swamp country. A stretch of this is known to this day among the Maoris as “Te Tina Roa,” otherwise “Long Tea Dinner” Road. Some of Preece's old soldiers explained to me that one day the Arawa navvies working half-way across the swamp found to their huge annoyance that the cook
Sergeant-Major Bluett, of the Armed Constabulary, formerly an officer in the Gold Coast Force, West Africa.

Sergeant-Major Bluett, of the Armed Constabulary, formerly an officer in the Gold Coast Force, West Africa.

had forgotten to send their mid-day meal supplies along and they had nothing but a billy of tea to sustain them till they returned to camp. Camp cooks had a way of getting drunk then, as now, and getting their heads punched when the hungry toilers reached home at night.