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| Ruins of the dinning hall of a mining camp along the Clutha River |
The cruise trip down the Clutha River was like going home. All those man made rock walls, built up against large boulders along the banks of the waterway reminded me of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah in the United States.
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| Clutha River |
Janet and I have a book out " Rock Art Along the Way". Research for that book took us into may places that looked like the ruins along the Clutha River. There was one large difference: the Southwest ruins dated back as far as 2,000 years where as the Otago Valley ruins dated back to the gold rush days of 150 years ago. Oh, there is also another small difference. The Southwest of the US didn't have a year round running water supply available.
Steve Toyer, owner of Clutha River Cruises, boarded our small group on his licensed pontoon boat and gave us a delightful afternoon of gold mining history. Just as our weather was treating to dump rain on us, so it must have been for the gold miners back in time. Some kind of shelter was necessary and there were mountains of rocks around. With large boulders fused into the earth already, all they had to come up with was two or three additional rock walls, some kind of roof covering and they were out of the rain. Supplies came into camp via wheelbarrows. Some mining groups were more efficient than others. The Chinese had a long history of "how to do the job" and they built their mining operation accordingly. Their ruins are in better shape today, because of it.
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