48 - Sunday, August 11. 1991 ~ North Shore News

More than meets the eye in

RUSSELL — Tourism used to be such a simple affair.

People went to Hawaii for the sun,

shopping and Torquay for silly hotels.

New Zealand was known as a
place for young people to go
backpacking and seniors to potter
in the byways.

Nowadays you can do just
about anything in New Zealand,
from skiing to golf to bungy-
jumping, marvel at the scenery,
sleep soundly after a day counting
sheep, and you couldn’t meet
more hospitable people.

And there’s more than meets
the eye in some places, like
Russell. a little village in the Bay
of Islands 150 miles north of
Auckland.

In the peak summer months of
January and February the Kiwis
pack the kids into their Morris
Minors and Triumph Heralds and
motor up to the hotels, boarding
houses and campgrounds of littie
towns like Russell.

Others come by yacht and ex-
plore the 150 islands, the bays
where Zane Grey used to fish for
striped marlin, yellowfin tuna and
blue sharks, and where Captain
Cook dropped anchor in 1769.

Cook and his gentlemen natu-
ralists were the first Europeans
here. Cook named Cape Brett
while Joseph Banks noted ‘‘the
bay was a most surprising place ...
full of harbors as smooth as mill-
ponds.”

Settlers soon followed, in-
cluding chandlers and grog shop
operators who did a roaring trade
with whalermen.

Russell became known as the
helihole of the Pacific and in 1830
was the scene of a war that started
over two Maori girls who each
claimed to be the favorite of a
whaling captain.

In 1835, Christ Church, the
oldest church im New Zealand,
was built. Ten years later rioting
Maoris sacked the town and
chopped down the fiagpole four
times, but spared the church.

The Royal Navy’s HMS Hazard
helped out with a show of force,
but not before putting four can-
nonbalis through the church.

Today Russell is a delight to
visit. The easiest way is to take
Fuller’s cream boat (so called
because this was a milk run, so to
speak, picking up cream from
farmers around the bays) from
Paihia to Russell.

There is a fine Captain Cook
museum, grand views from
Flagstaff Hill (complete with pole

David
Wishart

TRAVEL TIPS

No. 5), and a fascinating collec-
tion of tombstones in the church-
yard,

I bougitt a tin of beer at the
Duke of Marlborough, which
boasts New Zealand’s oldest li-
quor licence, and fish and chips at
a shop around the corner, and
found a seaview bench.

Here was a spot to ponder the
times gone by, such as the 1880s
to 1930s, when this outpost was
served from Auckland by the
Clansmen, a Clyde-built steam-
ship.

As the museum historian wrote:
“Early evening Tuesday morning
the old ship arrived, discharging
her cargo and then pulled out for
her journey north ... on Thursday
or Friday she was back again
ready to load fish, kauri gum and,
in season, oysters. Wild indeed
was the storm that succeeded in
upsetting her schedule.

“It was said that only the
Clansman had the power of set-
ting Russell astir! Her departure
was a social fixture.’’

Near Paihia, a busy tourist cen-
tre, but not unbearably so, is
Waitangi, scene of the 1840 treaty
signing that created the New
Zealand nation.

There’s quite a bit to see here
including a Maori museum and
the largest war canoe in the world.
Close by is the government-ritn
Waitangi Hotel, and not far away
a golf course where the green fees
are remarkably, and _ typically,
cheap.

For a nautical view Rainbow

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TRAVEL

ussell, NZ

Photo submitted

TOMBSTONES TELL stories at Russell Church, the oldest in New Zealand.

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