Spectrum 345. Excursions and diversions

Rights Information
Year
1979
Reference
21768
Media type
Audio
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Rights Information
Year
1979
Reference
21768
Media type
Audio
Duration
00:28:26
Credits
RNZ Collection
Perkins, Jack (b.1940), Producer
Rockel, Ian, Speaker/Kaikōrero
Jesperson, Chris, Speaker/Kaikōrero

For the modern tourist, Rotorua presents a range of thermal virtuosity which has diminished little over the years. But exploration of the geothermal area has lost much of the adventure it once had.

In this programme, the history of tourism in the area is recalled through interviews and readings of contemporary accounts of visiting the thermal resort.

An man (Chris Jesperson) who came to area in 1906 as a coach driver, talks about driving the first coach to travel from Opotiki to Rotorua in one day. He drove into the Urewera country with Dr Bell, which was via a very narrow track.

Descriptions of travel by coach in New Zealand and the state of bush roads are read. It took about six hours to go 18 miles, which was typical.

Two women are heard exclaiming about the heat of water in a thermal pool.

Ian Rockel, Rotorua Museum director, is interviewed by Jack Perkins. He talks about the Venus Pool at Waiotapu, how eruptions at Mt Ngaruhoe have affected water levels in Kuirau Park pools, and mishaps which have occurred when people fall into thermal pools.

Bert Gleason, who came to Rotorua after World War I is interviewed and talks about finding work as a driver for the Rotorua Motor Transport company. He talks about the poor condition of roads and the many precautions drivers had to take.

Jack Perkins records at the Lady Knox Geyser in Rotorua, while Ian Rockel explains the history of the geyser and how its activation was discovered by prisoners adding soap powder to it when doing their washing.

Eye-witness accounts of an eruption at Waimangu are read. The second is by Alfred Warbrick and describes the death of his brother Joseph Warbrick and a party of tourists he was guiding in 1903, when Waimangu Geyser erupted.