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in the morning yet saw none . The Midland line stretches over two hundred kilometres between the towns of Rollston and Greymouth , and includes many major bridges and viaducts , not surprising in this part of the world that forms a part of the country ’ s Southern Alps , the mountains are also crossed , or rather passed through , by seventeen tunnels , the longest of which is almost nine kilometres .
I ’ m fascinated by this form of travel so an obsession to keep craning my head to see where the track was headed became a little dangerous . For God ’ s sake watch the road , Leigh .
The trains that run on the Midland line witness stunning scenery before linking with the TransAlpine and yet more jaw dropping views . It looked like an adventure of a different kind and one that would surely need to be visited in the future .
Our route soon took us to join the state highway 73 , and with it the mountain pass named for Arthur Dobson .
For centuries the local indigenous people , the Māori , had crossed the mountains of the region looking for pounamu , the famous greenstone of the region , for it is only found on the south islands west coast . They created passes that had been major exploration routes yet what is now known as Arthurs Pass had been abandoned for many generations and although Māori elders had described it to the European explorers many chose to ignore it .
In 1864 Dobson had been charged with finding a suitable route from Christchurch on the east coast through the interior to the shores of the Tasman Sea . He and his brother Edward set off and soon discovered the remains of the pass that had been described by the Māori elders , and although surveying some of the route
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