When Fiordlanders first plied the southern lakes
One of Southland’s unique boat designs was the Fiordlander-class vessel developed for the tourist trade on the southern lakes.
The first, Fiordlander 1, was launched in Lake Manapouri in 1963 by the Manapouri-Doubtful Sound Tourist Company, later Fiordland Travel.
The next of the class, Endeavour, was launched in 1965 and Resolution and Fiordlander Two in 1966.
One was transported daily between the lakes for the glowworm run on Te Anau, and its launch rails are still visible by the Department of Conservation visitor centre.
The vessels were eventually superseded by larger and faster craft but they have been repurposed, for example as supply vessels for Walter Peak and on the Million Dollar Cruise on Lake Wakatipu.
Careful what you wish for
Southland’s quickest granting of a wish occurred in 1941. Murdoch McKenzie drove a gig to Fortrose to visit his dying brother. As he was leaving he said: ‘‘Well, I hope I never end up like that. When I go, I’d want it to be quick.’’ The horse stumbled and Murdoch was thrown out and killed. He was buried six day before his brother.
River the biggest obstacle
The first overland journey from Southland to Dunedin was made by Lieutenant Spencer and William Hamilton, who left the future Invercargill on May 4 1850, and took 16 days to make the trip. The Clutha River would have been the biggest obstacle.
The official report to the Lieutenant Governor showed a vast tract of land suitable for agriculture and a willingness on the part of local Maori to sell it. ‘‘The country eastward of the Molyneux or Clutha, as far as Jacob’s River, offers peculiar advantages for the formation of an extensive settlement. The plain stretching eastward of the latter stream (Aparima River), for a distance of 40 miles, comprises at least 600,000 acres of rich soil clothed with fine grass.
‘‘The timber is everywhere very equally distributed, and the district, taken altogether, seems to vie in natural advantages with the best parts of the Middle Island. Eastward again of this plain a chain of densely-wooded hills (Catlins) extend as far as Molyneux district, having towards the sea an elevation of about 2,000 feet. Inland, however, they gradually decrease in height, and the masses of forest disappear altogether, giving place to the finest pasturage; this tract, broadest towards the south, where it meets the sea-coast, has an area of from 700,000 to 800,000 acres of fertile land.
‘‘The disappearance of the timber and consequent scarcity of fuel will prevent its subdivision into many small stations or sheep runs. At Tuturau the soil has proved extremely rich, and potatoes, raised by a solitary Maori family resident there, exceed in volume those brought by Bishop Selwyn from the Chatham Islands, which were considered as the most remarkable specimens of this sort grown in the southern hemisphere.
‘‘The proximity of this extent of fertile land to the Otago Block, with which in fact it is almost connected, suggests the propriety of closing with the natives in their present disposition to sell all that remains to them of the Middle Island.’’