✨ Geological Expedition Report
OTAGO
PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT
GAZETTE
PUBLISHED BY AUTHORITY.
All Public Notifications which appear in this Gazette, with any Official Signature thereunto annexed are to be considered as Official Communications made to those Persons to whom they may relate, and are to be obeyed accordingly.
By His Honor’s Command,
THOMAS DICK,
Provincial Secretary.
Vol. VI.] THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 1863. [No.*274.
GEOLOGICAL EXPEDITION TO THE WEST COAST OF OTAGO, NEW ZEALAND.
REPORT BY JAMES HECTOR, ESQUIRE, M.D., PROVINCIAL GEOLOGIST.
Note.—Dr. Hector desires it to be stated that although he considers this Report correct, yet, as it was hastily written, and he had not an opportunity of revising it, some slight inaccuracies may have crept in.
THOMAS DICK,
Provincial Secretary.
Dunedin, 19th October, 1863.
To the Provincial Secretary of the Province of Otago.
Sir—I beg to enclose, for the information of his Honor the Superintendent, a short and hastily prepared narrative of my explorations on the West Coast of the Province during the last four and a half months, from the time of my leaving Dunedin, on the 20th of May, until the 23rd September last. I also beg to enclose a rough chart of the entrance to the Kaduku River, which is mentioned in that narrative, and also a tracing of the first sketch of a map of the North West district, which I have in preparation, in order to assist the explanation of the route by which I have recently crossed from the West Coast to the Wakatipu Lake. Likewise, copies of the Meteorological Observations recorded on the West Coast up to the 31st August.
In the month of April last, I made a rapid excursion from the west shore of that lake along with Mr. Von Tunzelmann, nearly to the head of the west branch of the Greenstone River, following the track of Messrs. M’Kellar and Gum, two enterprising runholders, who explored that country, and were undoubtedly the first to obtain a view of the western slope of this Province, although it was quite impossible for them to have seen the sea from the point to which they reached.
Want of time and the occurrence of bad weather prevented my then going as far as I wished, yet the examination of the structure of the country left no doubt on my mind that the Southern Alps were traversed in this longitude by a depressed valley, similar in all probability to that recently described by Dr. Haast as leading from the head of the Wanaka Lake, and through which I might certainly expect to find an easy route between the East and West slopes of the Island. This impression I communicated verbally at the time to his Honor the Superintendent.
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Otago Provincial Gazette 1863, No 274
✨ LLM interpretation of page content
🌾 Geological Expedition to the West Coast of Otago
🌾 Primary Industries & Resources19 October 1863
Geological exploration, West Coast, Otago, Report, Expedition
- James Hector (Esquire, M.D.), Provincial Geologist, author of report
- Von Tunzelmann, Accompanied Hector on excursion
- M’Kellar, Runholder, explored country
- Gum, Runholder, explored country
- Dr. Haast, Described valley through Southern Alps
- THOMAS DICK, Provincial Secretary