Buyers of a camp site in the South Island could well strike gold. The Dansey’s Pass Holiday Park, located on the banks of the Maerewhenua River, in Waitaki, is on the market for sale in an area that still attracts treasure hunters.
In fact, the current owner bought the holiday park at 276 Dansey’s Pass Road in 2018 while out panning for gold in the area, says real estate agent Kitty Culp, of OneAgency.
At the time, the holiday park was owned by an American pastor and his wife, who approached him about buying the property, even helping with the finance.
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That gold-panner is now the father of four home-schooled children and the family is looking to buy land locally and live off grid, says Culp.
Gold for the buyers also comes in the form of the area’s connection with both the Chronicles of Narnia films, and a newly minted UNESCO Global Geopark, both of which bring visitors.
The property listing is for the entire Dansey’s Pass Holiday Park, which is set over 1.35ha of land.
The listing includes, eight cabins, an A-frame chalet, river front cottage, kitchen, ablution blocks, laundry, dining hall, and both powered and unpowered camping sites, says Culp. Also included in the sale is a three bedroom home and attached office for permanent or caretaker living.
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The holiday park was built originally by Bob and Ina Hutton in the 1950s. The cabins are believed to be old Ministry of Works huts or similar. They may have come from Twizel, says Culp. “A doctor built the A-frame [cabin] for his family, and his son takes his kids there now.”
The retro holiday park offers the classic 1950s kiwi family camping experience, “where long summer days were spent exploring, swimming, fishing and gold panning and nights were spent around the camp fires telling yarns under the New Zealand night sky,” she says. “It’s one of those camps that families have gone to for generations.”
Inside one of the A-Frame cabins. Photo / Supplied
The property encompasses 1.35ha in Waitaki. Photo / Supplied
As well as families, the Dansey’s Pass Holiday Park is also popular with school and university groups.
The property is listed with a deadline sale closing on September 28. Culp indicates that interested parties need to budget around $800,000 plus GST for the property.
The ultimate buyers may choose to run the holiday park as a summer business only, and take winters off, says Culp. However being on the Duntroon side of the Kakanui Range, the road is open all year. Only the top of the pass over the range closes in snow or heavy rain, she says.
A real bonus for the new owners is that the camp sits within the newly minted UNESCO Waitaki Whitestone Geopark, which was created to protect a number of local attractions including Elephant Rocks, Maerewhenua Rock Art, and Valle of the Whales.
The geopark, which received accreditation earlier this year, is the only UNESCO accredited site in Australasia.
Close to the campground are Elephant Rocks, which were used as a location in the 2005 film Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Photo / Supplied
The large hummocky rock formations at Elephant Rocks, have another claim to fame. The 23 million-year-old rocky site was transformed into Aslan’s camp in the first Chronicles of Narnia movie in 2005.
Rattling Rocks, and Clay Cliffs are other local attractions in the Waitaki Valley.
On the other side of the mountain pass is Kyeburn Diggings. At the height of the gold rush in the 1860s the diggings had a public school with 60 children, and as many as 600 Chinese miners worked on terraces behind the settlement. ‘Chinaman’s Cutting’ as it was called had its own store.
It was known as a poor man’s gold field. Even so, a few miners are said to have hung on until the 1960s. Virtually all that’s left of the mining is terraces in the hills and the Kyeburn Diggings Cemetery.
Although no longer commercial, mining groups say there is still good gold to be had in the area. The valley is also rich in fossils, with whale skulls, dolphin vertebrae, sea urchins and sharks' teeth all found.
The pass itself and the road were named after William Heywood Dansey, who, in 1855 with three companions, was recorded as the first European to cross the pass in search of land in the Maniototo district. Subsequently Dansey leased or owned the Otekaieke run from 1857 to 1871.
