136 Transactions. 
gold fields developed itself so rapidly, that within a few weeks of the com- 
mencement of the works it was decided to construct a coach road throughout. 
From the date of this decision the works along the whole line of road, from 
the plains to the sea beach, were put in hand as rapidly as possible, and 
pushed forward with such energy that by the 20th of March, 1866, the road 
was open for traffic from end to end, and has been regularly travelled, ever 
since, by four-horse coaches running twice weekly each way ; the distance 
of 150 miles between Christchurch and Hokitika being completed in thirty- 
six hours, including a night stoppage of twelve hours at the half-way station. 
It is very difficult, by a verbal description, to give any idea of the ob- 
stacles that presented themselves to the construction of this road. Perhaps 
the greatest of all arose from the inaccessible character of the country ; the 
only way of getting tools and stores to the central portion of the work 
being either by poling canoes up the Teremakau from the beach, or by pack- 
horses travelling over the Hurunui saddle from the edge of the plains—a 
journey of seventy miles; and, moreover, this had to be done in a densely 
timbered country, in the depth of the winter. | 
No pen can describe the sufferings endured -by both man and beast 
during that terrible winter, exposed to sleet and snow and bitter frost, 
hardly lodged and scantily fed, whilst the working parties were liable at any 
moment to be cut off from communication with each other by the rising of 
the rivers. By the end of July, however, a pack-horse track was opened 
through the Otira Gorge, which enabled supplies to be taken into the Tere- 
makau Valley with comparative ease, and the works in the latter valley 
were greatly facilitated by the use of drays, which were carried in pieces 
across Arthur’s Pass and put together in the Teremakau river-bed, which 
was used as a temporary road whilst the bush clearings were being made. 
As, with the opening of the tracks, greater facilities were given for the 
conveyance of stores to the works, the number of men employed was 
inereased, until it amounted to upwards of a thousand. 
Since the opening of the road the work has gone steadily on, and may 
now be said to be completed, although, from the nature of the country 
through which it passes, it will always require constant attention to keep it 
in repair, especially in the valley of the Teremakau, which is periodieally 
visited by dangerous floods. 
The total distance from Christchurch to Hokitika by the Otira route is 
150 miles, as above stated, of which about one hundred miles of road from 
the eastern foot of the hills to the sea beach at the mouth of the Arahura, 
have been made and metalled between 1st May, 1865, and 31st October, 
1866, at a cost, in round numbers, of £145,000, or something under £1,500 
