Aorere gold[1]
Edward James and John Ellis, two of the earliest European settlers in the Aorere Valley, stopped by a stream while mustering cattle in October 1856. James found a small amount of gold. After further prospecting by G.W.W. Lightband, a digger who had been on the Australian goldfields, it was decided the findings justified a "gold rush". This was the start of the Aorere Gold Rush.
Lightband chaired a meeting in February 1857 at which diggers developed a set of rules later used in goldfields around the country.
William Washbourn was one of many to head to the area from Nelson. With his 11-year-old son Harry, William spent several months prospecting. Harry described the start of the gold rush as "a large camping picnic with everyone in the highest spirits, optimistically expecting to make a fortune"
The Aorere Goldfield lay on the conspicuous sloping, ravine-gashed tablelands that flank the mountains on the left all the way to the head of the main Aorere valley. In the late 1890’s the Collingwood Goldfields Company undertook an ambitious scheme to bring water through five miles of fluming from high in the moutains to work Aorere sluicing claims.
Prospectors worked the alluvial gravels of goldfields in the Tākaka and Aorere valleys, with Ferntown becoming a boomtown. The Māori settlement at the mouth of the river was known as Aorere, but the growing town there was known as Gibbstown, after William Gibbs who subdivided his land into sections for sale. The Nelson Provincial Government, thinking that a substantial population would develop, had a new town named Collingwood laid out on the plateau. Both names were used for a time, but Collingwood prevailed, although Gibbstown was later used as the name of the Rating District.
In 1857 the settlement consisted of just two tents, but by 1858 successive waves of fortune hunters had arrived. There were seven hotels, and the 1858 Census recorded 700 European and 200 Māori inhabitants. The rush proved short lived, and by 1859 most prospectors had moved on to easier gold in the Buller and Central Otago. In September 1861, however, the Otago Witness optimistically reported: "...we have much pleasure in stating that Captain Walker of the "Supply" brought with him from Collingwood, during the last week, no less than 206 ounces of gold....and that accounts from the Aorere state that all industrious men on those diggings are doing well".
To log the cache: Locate the Gold field memorial which is on the left of the highway from Takaka heading to Collingwood, a short distance before the highway descends to Collingwood township.
Send the answers to the following questions to the CO. Please do not include the answers in your log.
You can log the cache right away but loggers who have not provided the answers may have their log deleted.
1. Do some research online and findout where, when and by whom was gold first discovered in New Zealand and message me the answer?
2. Message me the 3 words at the very bottom of the plaque "Looking South West up the Aorere"
3. OPTIONAL- Take a photo from the memorial looking southwards across the Pakihi Plains to the Aorere Goldfields and include you, your GPS or an item that identifies your caching name.
Thanks for visiting my Virtual Reward 3.0 cache and happy caching :)
DOC Aorere Goldfields Track
Plan my walk Aorere Goldfields map
[1] http://www.theprow.org.nz/enterprise/aorere-gold/#.Ys0UGYRByUk
Please leave the following text at the bottom of the page, so cache finders understand the Virtual Rewards 3.0 project.
Virtual Rewards 3.0 - 2022-2023
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between March 1, 2022 and March 1, 2023. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards 3.0 on the Geocaching Blog.