On to Greymouth, a Car Yard no more

It was a short 29km drive down SH6 from Barrytown to our next stop at Greymouth.  The coast road took us up and down hills covered in native forest, with glimpses of the coast, beautiful everchanging scenery all the way.

Cliffs and sea views on the way

Turning off at Runanga for the dump station which was situated behind the Runanga Working Mens Club – Monteith's is obviously the beer of choice around here.  This town  was yet another coal-mining town, as can be seen with the cart of coal on display.

Also in this small town is the Runanga Miners' Hall.  The current structure dates from 1937, and replaced an early miners' hall from 1908 that was destroyed by fire.  The hall is notable for its place in the history of the organised labour movement in New Zealand, and was granted historic place category 1 status by Heritage New Zealand in 2013.  Although looking rather worse for wear, it is currently being restored.

Runanga Miners’ Hall

The Cobden Bridge brought us into Greymouth, and we made our way to Central Park Camping, up behind the Challenge Petrol Station, nice and handy to the shops.  Last time we were here this campground was also a laundromat and a car sales yard, believe it or not.  We remember the owner moving the cars around to make room for our group of vans traveling together.  The car yard is long gone, but the laundromat business is still going strong.  We are on a  power site while we are staying here.

Central Park Camping

Greymouth is the largest town on the West Coast and the turn-around point for the famous Tranz Alpine Train.  Greymouth was founded during the West Coast gold rush of the 1860s, but for 150 years after this its economy was based on mining coal and native timber forestry. These brought prosperity to the town which at one point had 47 hotels.  The central part of Greymouth was regularly flooded when a high tide coincided with a flood in the Grey River.  A flood wall (locally known as ‘the great wall of Greymouth’) now protects the town, and provides a pleasant walk along the south side of the river. From the walkway we could see the Cobden Bridge which brought us to the town.  A friendly visitor took our photo for us.

On the walkway

After a couple of rather hot and sticky days here, the rain has now set in.  But we’ve had time to do copious amounts of laundry, restock supplies, refuel the Jeep, and have a quick look around town.  We are moving on tomorrow, can you guess where?