Population of 57

Trip Start Jul 28, 2006

Trip End Ongoing

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Where I stayed

Otira Hotel

(Hokitika hotels)

Flag of New Zealand Otira, New Zealand
Thursday, November 30, 2006

Otira is a tiny hamlet, (when I say tiny, I mean tiny) nestled in the Mountains of Arthurs Pass National Park, New Zealand. Originally built as a railway village in 1923, it was once a pretty busy railway settlement with passenger trains, a station tearoom, a school, a heated swimming pool and a busy hotel. In the 60s there were about 600 people there. Since the 80s it gradually declined as the railways downsized (population now: 57). The station restaurant and the school have been closed. Many of the houses have been pulled down or vandalised. In 1998 Chris and Bill Hennah felt sorry for the place and bought the lease of the land, and without knowing that came ownership of the hotel, seventeen houses, the community hall, the fire station and engine and the swimming baths. Later they also bought the school, just to round things off.
With this in mind, and seeking a 'unique local NZ experience', we booked into the Otira Hotel. Chris and Bill are incredibly nice people who are trying to complete the restoration of a historic hotel and village at Otira. The hotel is charming in that mismatched sheets and uneven floorboard kind of way. It does, however, have a very comfortable bar and dining area with log fireplace (good since the town only gets 3 hours of sun per day if they're lucky, which mens very cold nights). The hotel has a very relaxed hospitality philiosophy, so much so that we were left to our own devices behind the bar after Bill went to work in the evening! We also got a very delicious home cooked roast dinner with apple crumble, courtesy of Chris.
You can imagine there wasn't much to do there, so we mostly just sat around drinking, talking, reading, playing chess (not me, but others did), which was a nice, relaxing evening. We all had to put our electric blankets on before going to bed it got that cold! I was already at the point of wearing every warm thing I owned and still shivering. I was sat next to the log fire most of the night come to think of it...
The next day we went on to explore the Arthurs Pass National Park area, which is gorgeous being in the middle of the mountains. It was the first day of summer, but you'd never know it because it was snowing. So we did the only sensible thing to celebrate: had a snowball fight. Some people had never had one of these before (damn Aussies) and got pummelled by the rest of us. We stopped at a really nice cafe for some lunch, then proceeded back to Otira Hotel to wait for the TranzAlpine train.
The station is directly beside the hotel, so you can see the tracks from the windows. We had a couple of hours to kill, so again the books and chess set came out. Then, all of a sudden 20 minutes before we're supposed to be at the train station, the train pulls in. One girl thankfully noticed, and with an "um, isn't that our train?" we grabbed our bags (also thankfully already packed and waiting) and bolted for the train. The train conductors were less than pleased with us, since according to them we should have been at the station 30 minutes prior to the train time. They did have the decency to wait for us, until everyone got their stuff on the train, which did take all of five minutes.
Once on the train and after the cussing out had died down, we were on our way back to Christchurch through the second longest train tunnel in New Zealand. This tunnel was started in 1908 and not completed until 1923, much of it built with pick-axe and shovel. On the journey to Christchurch three extra engines are added to pull the train uphill through the tunnel, since it's so steep.
I love train rides and this was the last one of New Zealand, and also my whole trip. I just stared out the window the whole time at the passing scenery, which changed from mountains to flat plains to city scape. I almost didn't want to reach Christchurch, because it signalled the end of my time in NZ.