A long time ago, I worked alongside a reporter named Leslie
Walters.
Les got into journalism after a stint in the army. He was a
likeable character with an idiosyncratic view of the world.
It soon became apparent that Les wasn’t exactly suited to
the role of hack reporter, writing formulaic news stories about car accidents
and council meetings.
His career might have gone nowhere had it not been for the
late Frank Haden, editor of what was then the Sunday Times. Frank appreciated Les’s offbeat sense of humour and
had the good sense to give him some stylistic freedom.
The result was a mad, anarchic weekly feature that combined
elements of Monty Python, Spike Milligan and Private Eye. Les seemed to inhabit a parallel universe. It wasn’t
journalism, but it was funny and original and it attracted something of a cult
following.
Perhaps inevitably, it also attracted the attention of a
recruiter from an advertising agency, which brings me to the point of this
column.
It was in advertising that Les found his niche. And if his
name means nothing to most New Zealanders, those of a certain age will
certainly remember the slogan he was credited with creating for the tourism
industry in the 1980s. “Don’t leave town till you’ve seen the country” was
aimed at encouraging people to experience New Zealand rather than book plane tickets
to foreign destinations.
It’s a phrase that has insinuated itself into the national
consciousness, rather like “The drink you have when you’re not having a drink”,
which came from roughly the same era and is remembered long after the brand it
advertised (Claytons) vanished.
I thought about Les’s slogan while on a recent caravan trip
with my wife around the top half of the South Island. His advice remains as
true now as it was three decades ago.
At Ashley Gorge in North Canterbury, we had one of the
country’s most exquisite camping grounds to ourselves (although to be fair, it
was fully booked the following weekend, which was Canterbury’s Anniversary
Weekend).
At remote Lake Coleridge, we marvelled at the grit of the
engineers and workers who created one of the country’s earliest hydro-electric
power stations in a beautiful but inhospitable landscape. My father, who was an engineer with the State Hydro-Electric Department, would have been fascinated.
On the return drive, the view over the vast, braided bed of
the Rakaia River against its mountain backdrop almost literally stopped us in our tracks. You can see why the
Canterbury high country captivated artists like Rita Angus and Bill Sutton.
We drove through charming little North Canterbury towns with
Tolkienesque names like Windwhistle and Glentunnel, the latter with its
fabulously eccentric gazebo-shaped brick post office (still in use).
On the road across Arthur’s Pass, we played vehicular
leap-frog with rental camper vans that were constantly pulling off to the side
of the highway so their goggle-eyed occupants could take pictures.
We roamed in the chilly, swirling mists at the top of the Denniston
Incline, where a hardy community of 1400 people once eked a living from coal.
It’s an extraordinary place that all New Zealanders should make the effort to
visit.
Quirky takeaway fact: it was said that the local football
team had an advantage against visiting sides because the Denniston players were
able to locate the ball by ear in the thick fog. They were also known to take
advantage of the poor visibility by sneaking extra players onto the field.
At Runanga, we admired the famous old miners’ hall (c. 1908) with its
faded socialist slogan “The World’s Wealth for the World’s Workers”. It remains
true that more than any other part of New Zealand, the Coast has a culture all
its own.
We did some of the standard touristy things: Punakaiki,
Farewell Spit, the celebrated Mussel Inn in Golden Bay (greatly over-rated, if
you ask me, with a menu that wouldn’t require much more culinary skill than
KFC).
But here’s the thing: Almost everywhere we went, our fellow
travellers were from overseas. At lonely Lake Coleridge, at the end of a rough
and dusty road that would deter a lot of drivers, we met an adventurous
Scandinavian woman touring alone on a motorbike.
In a camping ground at Greymouth, we shared the kitchen with
a big group of Israelis. At Denniston, we shared the mist with tourists from
Australia.
On the long, winding road to French Pass, surely one of New
Zealand’s most spectacular drives, most of the vehicles we passed were rentals
of the type that overseas visitors hire. I was impressed to see an intrepid
Asian woman tackling the route alone.
Not for the first time, I marvelled at the number of foreign
tourists who find their way to beautiful, out-of-the-way places that most New
Zealanders never see. Outsiders seem to appreciate our country in a way that
not all New Zealanders do.
Okay, it wasn’t the holiday season, so we probably weren’t
seeing a typical sample. Still, I couldn’t help thinking of Les Walters and his
advertising slogan.
6 comments:
When we arrive to NZ a decade ago, I remember doing weekend trips around the North Island fascinated by the beauty of our country. It is outdoor tourism paradise, and didn't cost us much to do (campings, cabins, cheap as).
After ten years, we are still doing the same, and enjoying it just the same. It's amazing how some people get used to it, and yet others keep appreciating it. I make a conscious effort to remain among the latter.
Karl, not a post as such, but you dredge up a name from my own idiosyncratic past. Lesley Walters. I worked with Lesley on building sites around Wellington 1972-73? We were a dysfunctional bunch of individuals. Lesley would turn up for work wearing army shorts carry a swagger stick, smoking a pipe and wearing a monocle for effect. It was around this time he was producing his satirical column for the Sunday Times that you write of.. Lesley had a total lack of regard for authority figures and his takes on the politics of the day inspired and educated me politically. Our core group consisted of committed anarchists who were often followed by the then SIS and who later found fame in England when they stood in the dock at the Old Bailey charged with treason, a ladies man who was chased by legions of women swearing their undying love and who, after running of to Zimbabwe to start a plastics extrusion company, had to flee Mugabe's secret police in the dead of night hidden in the back of a van. Then there was the mad motorcycle mechanic whose childhood sweetheart went on to become an influential Labour Party MP. My own attempts to become an international master criminal hit a few rough patches and I found myself hiding out in the back country of the Northern Wairarapa or the Southern Hawkes Bay as some would call it depending on which way one was facing. Precious memories of a thousand stories fueled by your own memories.
As I type, I am looking after a rural property in Ashley Gorge, about 2 km from the camping ground you mention. A lovely spot indeed, but overrun at this time of year. A-Gorge has its own micro-climate, quite different from areas only a few kilometres to the east. A-G (as I call it) can be almost terrifying in its weather extremes however, from raging NW winds that tear down mature trees, to freezing snowfall that does similar. On the right sort of day, the view from A-G extends all the way out to Banks Peninsula.
Instead of promoting tourism, why not just save the money and make facilities a bit better for individual travellers like yourself and those you met.
Let's welcome intrepid international travellers who happen to have thought of coming to NZ, but let's dissuade mass tourism by not promoting the destinations.
The mass movement of tourists will soon be a plague in the nicest spots, as they are in many places overseas, including in places across the Tasman. Been in downtown Sydney recently?
Vested interests push for international mass tourism, but for the ordinary person, the negatives will soon outweigh the positives.
I agree with Vaughan - let's distinguish between travellers and tourists. Only those who've lived in, or tried to visit 'tourist destinations' as a genuine traveller, eg. KdF and his wife, will ever understand the difference.
Just one example exists in a tiny seaside town, complete with narrow streets and minimal parking spaces, named Akaroa, on Banks Peninsula. Between November and April it seethes with drifting, milling throngs of tourists, most of whom have come off cruise ships, the remainder having arrived in cars, vans and buses on a highway that was never designed to accommodate that level of traffic. The congestion is appalling at times.
A rural friend once described the scene as being “like maggots on the a**e of a fly-blown sheep” (Fred Dagg or Wal Footrot would have approved of the imagery).
Just one example exists in a tiny seaside town, complete with narrow streets and minimal parking spaces, named Akaroa, on Banks Peninsula. Between November and April it seethes with drifting, milling throngs of tourists,
We stayed in Akaroa for several days in September, as a treat before I started my new job. It was quite lovely, and tranquil.
We did drive there though, from Christchurch. And we flew there from Wellington. But we aim to fly and drive as much as possible before such delights are banned.
Post a Comment