If at First You Don't Succeed,Try Again..................................Into Molesworth!

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We are starting to think that the fine weather will follow us all the way on this trip.

We weren’t going to hang around too long before getting on the road as we had read conflicting reports of the time it would likely take to get to the Molesworth Cob Hut and back to Hanmer Springs, a distance of about 170km for the round trip.

The road out through the Awatere River Valley to SH1 is still closed from the Cob Hut due to very heavy rainfall events last year that washed out the original rain and then the one the council prepared along the riverbank. So our drive will be in and out on the same road.

Before we left home I had read on the DOC website all about the road and things to see and do on the way and also printed off their extensive brochure.

However I left it at home and so we headed off this morning completely forgetting what the brochure had said about the two access roads you can take to enter the area from Hanmer.

We used Jollies Pass Road which turned out to be a big mistake and soon had us wondering how we were ever going to see Molesworth without a four wheel drive vehicle.

After leaving the tar seal, which we had expected on the outskirts of Hanmer village, the gravel road wasn’t too rough as long as we didn’t exceed 50kph for the first kilometre of so. There were signs where the tar seal ended which advised that the road was not maintained but nothing about 4 wheel drives only.

We drove carefully up the hill with the road ‘hanging’ onto to the hillside and just wide enough for one vehicle in most places. What we would have done had we met a downhill vehicle we never found out, thank goodness!

As we progressed up to the summit the state of the gravel road got worse and we slowed often to dodge deep ruts. We were fortunate we didn’t have much weight in the rear of the Corolla as we might have done some damage to the underside of the car.

As we neared the top a large buggy vehicle with sizeable roll bars and a driver wearing a hard hat, goggles and raring to get in front of us. He was driving something that was built for the road, we weren’t!

Then as we got onto a slightly straighter piece of road more of these buggies appeared in the rear vision mirror, all looking eager to get past our slow moving vehicle.

Thankfully the summit arrived quickly and there was space to pull over and all 8 buggies revved by us while we sat, doubting whether we should be on this road at all.

That doubt was confirmed a short distance on when in front of us was a sizable ford to cross and we decided to turn around and head back to Hanmer and check out if there was a 4 wheel drive trip offered by a local adventure business.

After a 10 point turn and bouncing back down the hill we went into the Information Centre and told the young woman of our experience and asked whether there was a tour we could purchase to spend the day sightseeing through Molesworth.

It was clear when the young woman laughingly told us that Jollies Pass Road was only for 4 wheel drive vehicles and that the sign we had seen about the road not being maintained meant just that!

She did give us a couple of brochures on trips offered by local businesses into Molesworth but also explained that had we taken the other road, Jacks Pass Rd and onto the Clarence Valley Rd we would have been OK in our Corolla although there were still some parts of thro ad where we would encounter ruts especially on corners as logging trucks used the early part of the road down to Hanmer.

So with renewed confidence we would get to do what we wanted we set off and up a hill again on a road that was almost twice the width of Jollies Pass and an easier gradient. We even passed two cyclists on ordinary push bikes as we progressed to the summit.

Down the other side and we passed a Molesworth Station sign that signified that we were about to start the drive that would enable us to tick off another adventure that had been on our bucket list for many years.

The road was still gravel but well maintained and it was relatively easy to get along at 50/60kph.

We passed by where Jollies Pass Rd would have bought us into Molesworth had we continued and the road straightened and headed in a general northerly course.

Initially the road followed the Clarence River through a valley with steep hillsides that changed around almost every corner.On the other side of the river it appeared that a lot of work had gone into killing off a lot of invasive Wilding pines.

There was a small herd of cattle that roamed freely and it was clear they were used to motor vehicles as they stayed clear of the road.

Without any advance notice there was a ford we had to negotiate to continue on our way and we weren’t going to be put off now that we had got this far.Driving through fords is not one of Gretchen’s best experiences but she did it well and we were back on the gravel quickly.

Just before the Acheron Homestead and Campsite was the first of 3 gates that had to be opened and closed. The homestead was built in 1863 and was originally used as an overnight stay on the 6 day carriage ride from Nelson to Christchurch. The building had some damage in the 2016 earthquake but seemed to have been repaired so you wouldn’t notice where the damage occurred.

There were 2 four wheel drive vehicles that we were to come across a few times more as the day progressed although these were the only ones we saw on the road all day.

Shortly after leaving the homestead site we came across the confluence of the Clarence and the Acheron Rivers and drove on to follow the latter for a good distance. Here the valley views in two separate directions were wide and really quite amazing with colours of the hillsides striking under the clear blue sky.

Where the rivers joined was also the boundary between the Canterbury and Marlborough provinces and we continued still on a generally northern path.

All the way from where we joined the Molesworth Station there had been the power pylons carrying surplus electricity generated from the South Island hydro stations to the North Island. At times the pylons got in the way of photographic opportunities and we hoped that when we made the return journey we might get a different angle to get the photos we wanted.

The road we were travelling on had been upgraded in the mid 1960’s when the route was chosen to carry the power pylons from the south to the north which made it possible for tourists to be able to see this unique area.

For a short while the road left the Acheron River and ran alongside the Severn River only to return to the Acheron as the road headed towards Wards Pass at 1145 metres above sea level and part of the Inland Kaikoura Range.

The pass was discovered by the surveyor Joseph Ward in 1847 and the road is listed on the website ‘Dangerous Roads of Australia and New Zealand.

Although it was steep on both sides and of course there were no barriers on the drop down the hillside we hardly think that this road should be making ‘Dangerous Roads’ especially compared to one we had to turn around on in Montenegro in 2013 on the BBA V2.

It was only a short distance to the current Molesworth Cob Cottage built in 1866 as a one room shelter but extended later to what you see today..Here there was the relief of a portaloo which despite the fact it was a no flush toilet was better than trying to find a bush alongside the road that was tall enough to hide you from any passing traffic, if there had been any.

A short walk through a paddock with a friendly looking bull or two and we suddenly came across a panoramic view of the current Molesworth Station and all its associated buildings for the cookhouse and drovers accommodation etc.Behind was Mt Chisholm named after Bill Chisholm who was the farm manager between 1942 and 1978 and helped turn an eroded sheep farm to a profitable pastoral beef farm. The nearby Rachel Range, where Wards Pass is located is named after his wife.

The gate out of the Cob Cottage area towards SH1 was closed and it is beyond here through the Awatere Valley that the road is currently closed.

After a chat with the local volunteer wardens, who live in this isolated location in their campervan and partly in a one room relatively modern hut we headed back over the 80 odd kilometres to Hanmer.

As expected the scenery did appear different in many places as the road wandered its way back to the Clarence Valley and we continued to take photos and video as the scene changed before us.

This time on the way back Gretchen practised putting the Corolla into a low gear with the idea of ‘gunning it’ through the one ford we had to cross.

This time our passage through the ford was a faster approach with the front of the Corolla hitting the water and spraying it across the windscreen and then we were out the other side. The dust on the front of the car was gone but our front dive into the ford didn’t do anything for the thick, fine dust on the rear parts of the car.

By the time we got back to our apartment we had been out for about 6 hours and we were looking forward to a beer and dinner at O’Flynns Bar just up the road.

The weather had been perfect, the scenery was fantastic and we were so pleased we had ticked another ‘must see’ place on our bucket list.

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