Overview
Sun. Oct. 13
At 7.30 Clif + I set out on horseback for a trip across the sandhills from Lake Horowhenua to the coast so that I could
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get data with aneroid to make a section of the coastal lowland. Rode to edge of lake at north-west end via Beach + Hokio Roads. The grassy sandhills on west side of the lake are riddled with rabbit holes + not safe to ride over quickly. Left edge of lake at 9.14am + took levels of crest of ridge up to top of Moutere, gettting the distances by pacing. Top of Moutere at 9.50am. This time 13 lagoons were visible from the trig. Decided to determine distances betweeen Moutere + beach by pacing + settled on a line running out to a point just rough to the Hydrabad wreck. Clif led my horse + I footed it, leaving Moutere at 10.19am. The grassy sandhills to the west of Moutere are far superior to those between it + Lake Horowhenua, being free of rabbit burrows and well-grassed. After traversing about 7 sandhill ridges I came to the edge of a huge flat with bare sand-drifts on the further side. As this flat had wet swampy hollows on it. I determined its width with the compass + a 5 chain base-line (as per sketch) I skirted
[sketch at bottom of page]
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round the edge to the base of the sand-drifts. Took a 1/4 pl[ate] photo (1) of the sand-drifts encroaching on the flat with Clif + horses in foreground, looking west, + another (2) of the same from the top of the drift on line of section looking NE. Beyond this belt of bare sand, we found another area of grassy dunes having a similar encroaching frontage + beyond this there was bare sand with very sparse vegetation here + there, right to the beach which we reached at 12.19pm. Ate our lunch as we rode along beachhomeward. Saw two parties fishing + fine specimens of schnapper [sic] + kawhai [sic] lying on the beach. Weather turned out very hot. Home at 2.30. Gertie + I drove to church in evening.
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[High resolution image of whole page is available by scrolling through images attached to George Leslie Adkin personal diary, May 1917-February 1919