FIRST ACROSS THE GORGE

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The old Deep Gorge Bridge on the Ngaumu Road is a registered heritage construction, considered of both technical and historic value. An open-truss timber bridge, it was built across the 40-metre-deep Upokongāruru stream gorge in 1915-16 to give access to the new Poroporo settlement of smaller farms.

    It spans 44 metres and cost £2318, funded by the Department of Lands and Survey. The Public Works Department was then forming the Ngaumu Road. A notice on the bridge, now gone, named the contractors as Messrs McCalment Bros.

    The bridge had a second life after the 1936 earthquake, in which the cliff face on the southern side slipped. In 1938 it was moved two metres downstream onto new concrete foundations. One report said the 100-ton structure had to be moved "an inch or two at a time", all watched by "a large gathering of settlers".

    A new replacement bridge was built alongside it in 1984. The old bridge was used for bungy jumping in the gorge in the 1990s.

    The Poroporo settlement was created by the government in 1914 on land bought from Brancepeth and subdivided into 17 farms.