Memoirs of a local scenic reserve
The inside scope on history behind Te Awamutu’s local treasure
There is an ancient forest containing 400-year-old Kahikatea trees, located 4.5km north of Te Awamutu, 2km westward off SH3 on Ngaroto Road.
Originally the land was owned by a local family and horseman, Sandy Yarndley, before being sold to both the District Council and the Forest Heritage Fund in 1991, who agreed to preserve the land and its giant treasures. Yarndley’s Bush was created as a scenic reserve the following year, allowing public access.
However, prior to this agreement Yarndley’s Bush was a backyard paradise for the Yarndley generations and their peers to enjoy.
“My father tried to put a track literally through the middle of the bush. He had about three bulldozers stuck before he had managed to get them out. The reason my father created the track was so it was simpler to access the bush as my grandfather grew older”.
– Sandy Yarndley
The Yarndleys would take students from the junior class at Pekerau Primary school to the Yarndley farmland for a walk down to the bush, as a class outing.
Rather surprisingly, after the retired draft horses from Yarndley’s Farm were ‘put down’, the children from Pekerau Primary school would carry the bones of the horses more than 1500 metres down the track to the bush one year; and the following year the next group of children would carry them back up to the other end of the track, for entertainment.
“So, these bones were walking up and down the bush”, Sandy Yarndley merrily recalls
Sandy’s grandfather would take bottles of beer down to the bush and leave them under a tree, amongst the tree roots.
The grandfather would then take some of his mates down to the bush and ask them, “If there was one thing you could have right now, what would it be?”
His friends would then respond, “Well a cold beer would be bloody marvelous of course”.
He would disappear for a few moments and return with a few cold beers, perfectly preserved in the coolness of the tree roots in the bush, and the looks on his friends’ faces were priceless. It was like Christmas!
These are few family memories that Sandy recalls, of the bush prior to its establishment into a scenic reserve. Now many more families can create memories just as treasured as theirs.
