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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 4, Issue 3 (July 1, 1929)

The Narrow Way

The Narrow Way.

In the lower gorge the vertical cliff-faces have no shrub or fern; but all around the fragrant bush climbs in high unbroken green. The mountains send densely timbered buttresses sheer to the yellow-brown river, and along the straight left bank our road is carved, chambered, trenched, tunnelled. The railway, when it comes, will, I suppose, take the other bank, the right, which mercifully is less steep than the way our road has been scooped.

And at last the hills step back, and with relief after the long defile of bush and cliff we tumble out and fall to on a square meal in Westport, where our coal comes from.

Well, that is a sketchy outline of the Buller way to-day. Now, jump back into the past, eighty odd years, and discover our pioneer pathfinder, scout of the trackless woods, trudging the Buller country, gun on shoulder, fifty pound swag on back, not for a brief excursion but turning his steps away from the last outpost of civilisation for many a month.