Oram's Hotel
Auckland
New Zealand
Tuesday, June 5th 1888
My Dearest Mamie,
As you can see by the above, we are on the move again, I only wish we were moving home. However it would be very foolish to do so when there are so many things to be seen out here, and we are not likely ever to be in this part of the world again.
We arrived here last Sunday morning, after a fairly prosperous voyage (the details of which I shall relate to you later on), and mean to go to Ohinemutu [ed: Rotorua] in a day or two, to see something of the Hot Springs. I expect we will move as soon as possible, as this hotel is both dear and bad, besides the General is such a restless person that he never cares to stay long anywhere.
We were talking of going on to Sydney by the Tarawera [ed: Tasman Steamer] next Tuesday, but the General assures us that we would not have time to see all that is to be seen if we go then. I don't agree with him, especially as mother and I are already tired of Auckland, but as he intends to wait for the Rotomahana,*1 which starts a fort-night later, we prefer waiting for him.
I suppose we will be 4 or 5 days at Ohinemutu, as there ought to be a good deal to be seen there, and when we return here, we think of going on to Waiwera,*2 about ten or twelve miles distant, which we believe to be a very pretty place, and where there are hot springs and there we will remain till the Rotomahana starts.
When we go to Sydney, I expect we will go to stay with the Christians, which will be very pleasant. June out here corresponds with December at home, and in Christchurch it is quite warm, Roses are still in flower and heliotrope and yesterday we saw an areutilon flowering in the open air so you can imagine how mild it is.
Yesterday mother, General Algar and I went to see Mt Eden. We took an omnibus to the foot of it and then climbed up to the top. It is an extinct volcano and the crater has grass growing on its sides now. The general and I went down to the bottom, but mother preferred resting at the top. We had a very fine view from the top.
Auckland is a fine town, quite the largest we have seen in New Zealand, though of course not to be compared with Melbourne. General Algar joined us at Wellington, or rather we joined him there, and we travelled on here together. We had a very bad passage from Lyttleton to Wellington, and I was awfully sick. I never knew what sea sickness meant before, and I was in a horrid fright all the rest of the voyage for fear I should be ill again. However we had beautiful weather after that and enjoyed ourselves. We stayed a night at Wellington and so were able to see something of the town and senate houses.
Almost all the buildings are of wood and some are very large. One set of Government buildings is supposed to be the largest wooden building in the world. The Wellington girls seem to have more ideas on the subject of dress than any other New Zealand girls I have seen. At Dunedin and Christchurch, the only decent dresses I saw were those that had come from home. They spend lots of money on their clothes, and have good material, but their dresses are generally very dowdily made and cut, and their hats and jackets are simply awful.
Mrs Oliver showed us her new dresses when we were at Wellington, and some of them were very pretty. She has a bad figure, or rather NO figure, yet when she has her good dresses on she looks remarkably well. She has given us the address of her London dress maker, who chooses and makes all her clothes. She showed us one dress of thick corded silk, beautifully made, with a train and a foundation of itself, which she told us only £9-9- complete. I think it had a little trimming of watered silk but I can't quite remember.
Mother has the address, and I will give it to you. Mrs Oliver simply writes that she wants a dress for such and such a purpose, with gloves and bonnet to suit, and she gets just what she wants, at a very moderate price. I think this dress maker would be worth trying.
We left Wellington on Thursday about one o'clock PM and arrived at Picton in the evening. The General and I went ashore, but it was too dark to see anything. We left about four o'clock the next morning and arrived at Nelson at about 11.30. We had two hours to go ashore in, and we wandered aboutand the General took some photos, but there was nothing in particular to see or do, so we were not sorry to get back to the steamer. We had been in so early in the morning too, before sunrise, which made us feel rather lazy.
The country all round Nelson was wild and hilly, and opposite the harbour there was a beautiful range of blue mountains, but the town itself is rather straggling and uninteresting. We started again at about two o'clock and arrived at New Plymouth early the next morning.
It was very pleasant steaming through the calm blue sea, land in sight more or less all the time, and each morning arriving in some fresh place, which we had time enough to explore. Of course if we had had bad weather it would have been quite another thing.
New Plymouth was quite the nicest place we stopped at and we had lots of time to see it in, as we arrived before breakfast, and did not start till three PM. The town is about 1 1/2 miles from the wharf, and we went up by rail.
The country is rather wild and undulating and has only one important feature, Mt Egmont, a mountain of 5,000 feet, with perpetual snow on its summit, standing qutie alone, which makes it look larger than it really is. We were very much afraid that we should not see it, as it has an irritating habit of wrapping itself in clouds and lying perdu for days together. When we arrived in the morning, you would never have suspected that there was any mountain near, but the clouds cleared off just as we were starting away, and we could see it long after we had left the place, in fact it was still distinctly visible at sunset.
The town of New Plymouth was nothing particular, and seemed to consist of one long street and a fwe little ones straggling off it. The gardens however were very pretty and we spent quite a long time there. There is a pretty piece of water there used for bathing in, and beside the bathing house stood a little wee ... called 'Vicky Barret', with an inscription which I copied and shall enclose in this letter [by the way, when we arrive in Sydney, we will be able to hear from you every week, and will write as frequently].
We went back to the steamer for lunch and afterwards pottered about on the beach and the General made himself very hot and breathless by climbing up to the top of a steep and high peak of rock, in a great hurry. The beach there is very curious being formed of Iron Sand, quite black, and glittering. We are bringing a little home in a cardboard box for Freddie to see.
Dress-makers address: Gore House, Harrington Road, London SW
ED:
1
The ship usually said to be the first to provide a regular interisland ferry service between Wellington and Lyttelton is the Penguin, a 794-ton steamer. Penguin began making weekly trips in April 1895.
Demand grew, and in November 1896 the interisland ferry service was expanded to three trips a week each way. In 1897 the Penguin was replaced successively by the bigger ships Te Anau (1,652 tons), Rotorua (931 tons), and Rotomahana (1,727 tons).
Rotomahana, when she entered the interisland ferry - Wellington-Lyttelton run in October 1897 was one of the best-known ships in Australasia.
Popularly and uncharitably known by the rhyming nickname "Rotten Banana", her far more well deserved title was "the greyhound of the Pacific".
2
For centuries, indigenous Maori travelled to Waiwera on New Zealand’s Hibiscus Coast to heal themselves in Waiwera’s therapeutic warm waters.
Maori would immerse themselves in holes dug along the idyllic beachfront and line them with branches for padding. Caressing mineral water would then gently surround them, magically materialising from the earth below.
Translated from Maori, Waiwera means simply ‘hot water’ but it was so revered that many referred to it as ‘te rata’ which translates as ‘the doctor’. The special healing powers of Waiwera water came to be known far and wide. People travelled to the resort by horse or steamer in the early days, disembarking at a man-made jetty. Many guests stayed at the hotel built at Waiwera in 1875 by Robert Graham.
Your affectionate sister,
Anna A Cairnes
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