Secrets of Garston

OPINION: With one seat in the ute, I wondered who was going to sit beside Terry — me or school principal Kathryn O'Loughlin, writes Gerry Forde in this week's Southlander.

"Can't have two Southland blokes nestling up," Kathryn replied as she nestled up.

So I got the window seat on this fixed wheel ascension of the steep hills of Garston.

We came to a gate. I looked at the farmer. Both the farmer and the teacher looked at me. I now knew why I had the window seat.

While the others waited I struggled to get the hook out of the hole, and then struggled to get it back in. Suddenly I realised it would have to go on the opposite way that it came off.

"Yahoo!" I yelled flushed with success. The others looked up and I wished they hadn't. I'd shut myself on the far side of the gate. I wasn't unlocking it again and leaped over the top.

We were now among the hills and in the distance the Nokomai Valley spread out green as a cricket pitch in paradise.

Three gates later I tried to solve one of the great mysteries of farming.

"Tell me Terry, why is every lock on a farm gate different?"

He looked out at the mountain range that separated us from Waikaia and replied, "To save us farmers getting bored opening them."

We had travelled as far as the Ute could go and crested the last hill on foot.

"Listen. You can hear the silence," said Terry There below was our Garston secret. Nestled in the wave of the tussock ridden hill and dwarfed by snow capped mountains sat the restored Chinaman's hut.

Made of turf sods with one room for living, eating and sleeping, the sole occupant had lived here to maintain the water race that was still etched in the surrounding hills, and once carried water from Garston to the gold dredging in the Nokomai Valley.

What a solitary life; separated from family back home and from the main group of Chinese gold miners at Nokomai. What did he think each morning as he opened the one door on the majesty of the Garston mountains?

Unlocking six different farm gates was enough for one day, unlocking the Chinaman's secret thoughts would take a weekend retreat.

I vowed to return.

» Gerry Forde is the Venture Southland regional identity brand manager.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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