Yesterday TRM’s report touched on the rich history of names of Tongariro River pools. Any ANZAC connections always include the Admiral’s Pool, named after the WW1 Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Jellicoe. Some of his historic connections were described in the previous blog, but did you know there was also another pool downriver, plus another prominent point on Lake Taupo named after him?

In the 1920s to 1940s, the lower river was intensively fished, as that was the only part of the river where anglers could access it. All the pools had established names which have now been forgotten. Anglers rarely ventured upriver beyond the main road bridge at Taupahi village as access was too difficult.

Above map, drawn by Lyn Lloyd of Sporting Life, provides the locations of many of the named lower river pools, now buried and lost by reduced flow changes from the Tongariro Hydro Power Project.

Tokaanu was originally established as a military outpost in the 1860’s. After WW1 the main resident native population occupied the village at Tokaanu. Anglers’ walking access to the Tongariro River comprised a balancing act on planks installed by the Tokaanu Hotel across the swamp towards the delta, about one km away.

On Morilleu’s map of 1928 Jellicoe Pool was located below Graces Pool. But these named pools have been known to move around as river contours change. In Whitney’s map of 1932 it is located below Willow Reach where the walking ramp from the Tokaanu Hotel first reached the Tongariro River. As such, it was the most popular pool.

The Admiral also gave his name to Jellicoe Point (see photo above) on Lake Taupo where a fishing camp was built for him at the mouth of the Waipehi Stream, just north of the Motutere Motor Camp.

The other sporting connections with Lord Jellicoe include the Jellicoe Cup, presented annually to the player who achieves the lowest individual score during the New Zealand Open golf championship. The trophy was first presented to the 1923 winner, Arthur Brooks, and is held “from year to year” by the winner of the Open. 

In addition to his interest in fly fishing, Lord Jellicoe also contributed to many other sporting events, such as the development of the X-class boats, (see photo below) a popular 14-foot dinghy type and had one built for himself, named the “Iron Duke”.  He presented the Sanders Cup, a prestigious trophy in New Zealand yachting, as a challenge to other yachtsmen. He took part in the first Sanders Cup series, and other national contests, and was patron of many yachting clubs.

Back to the Tongariro ANZAC connections, there were other pools and fishing spots named after ex-military anglers, such as Dan’s Pool located further downstream towards the delta at the confluence of an overflow known as Dan’s Creek and the main river. That was named after Dan Cullen, late of the Fifteenth Hussars, who worked as a guide back then with another ex-soldier, O’Malley. There are too many others with similar connections to repeat.

Many of these previously well-known, world-famous, established tourist pools have now gone, buried under thousands of tons of pumice sediment since the Tongariro Hydro Power Scheme was introduced. The continual layers of sediment also destroyed important spawning redds and covered the best Brown trout nursery in Lake Taupo. When the hydro power scheme effectively halved the volume of water down the Tongariro River over the last fifty years, the reduced flow was insufficient to carry the sediment load out to the delta of Lake Taupo.

Although a critical condition of the power scheme, as promised by the Government of the day and the Electricity Department (now Genesis), was that the famous trout fishing would not suffer. This was quickly ignored once permission was gained. The lower river continues to suffer from severe aggradation. After over fifty years of neglect by Councils and erosion from flooding, unfortunately, it is acknowledged that it will never recover. Further damage has been from Council contractors removing metal from the lower river pools. Previously, there were roads and tracks along each bank down to the delta. Now, all anglers’ access to the entire lower river has been blocked off.

Indeed, in recent years the Taupo Council has established flood hazard zones in Turangi in places that have never been known to flood. This confirms the increased threat caused by the aggradation. i.e. Tongariro River Motel was developed in 1959, 65 years ago, has never suffered any flooding problems but is now on Council’s register as being in a flood hazard zone. The Insurance companies charging increased danger fees must love it.

Tomorrow’s blog continues the ANZAC links with Major Jones Pool.