Kaikoura, New Zealand - Early Views #2

Stagecoach outside the Hapuku general store, just north of Kaikoura on the Seddon to Kaikoura Coach Road, circa 1905.

Land travel in North Canterbury has been difficult since the early days of European settlement. In the mid nineteenth century to the early 1900s, road travel by coach was long and arduous.

The steep, hilly terrain - most vividly impressed upon the mind of even today's road traveler by a drive through the Hundalees - and the rocky, narrow coastline made putting both road and rail links in place difficult.

Wagon passing through one of the many road tunnels on the coastal road south of Kaikoura, circa 1905.

To this day, the geography & climate combine in severe weather to challenge mere humans to keep the transport links free of slips and open. The railway line running through Kaikoura was not completed until 1945.