All Aboard The Driving Creek Railway

April 29

We quickly packed up and said sayonara to the Harborview Motel.

We drove to town and had a great breakfast and equally great coffee at UMU Reataurant and Cafe.

Last night we decided to book a two-hour train journey on the Coromandel Driving Creek Railway. Let’s just say it’s not your ordinary train journey. It was quite the adventure and we’re so glad we rode these tracks of history to learn about how and who built this incredible system of tracks.

Barry Brickell had big dreams as a potter. And he had remarkable ingenuity and talent, too. Born near Auckland, he began his career as a school teacher. In 1973, Barry purchased the land for its rich terracotta clay so he could focus on his craft full-time and teach other artists his art.

He became New Zealand’s first full-time handcraft potter and started a commune of sorts thanks to his hippy lifestyle.

Barry traded pottery and beers to help pay for the construction of his railway that he could use to access much richer clay from the hills he owned above his studio and home. He also used the mountain hillsides to build the country’s first wooden kilns, far away from his neighbors, who complained about all the smoke from kilns he had near the village.

Barry constructed the narrow-gauge railway to transport large quantities of clay 150 feet from the original clay pit to the pugmill in the pottery. He purchased old mining rails for his tracks from a coal mine that went out of business. He also exchanged his pottery with a local landowner for old rotten rock to use as ballast. He sent felled pine logs on the property to the local sawmill to cut and treat it for the rail ties.

But still, he needed to get higher up the mountain to access even more clay. After 5 years of precise surveying, track laying and building of four bridges by hand, Barry’s railway reached its first end point named Ravington. Ravington became the scene of many parties at the end of a good day’s work. As word spread about the railway, visitors came asking for a train ride, which originally went to Ravington and back for a small donation.

The railway continued to attract tourists, so Barry built an open-sided passenger wagon in 1982. He only accepted donations for this ride because he needed a license to operate the train commercially, which he finally obtained in 1990, making the railway a self-funded venture that no longer required him to trade pottery or accept donations to keep the operation in business.

As we switched back and zig-zagged up the hill, we continued up the tracks and passed under the double-deck viaduct he built. The top level of the viaduct carried passengers to Hoki-Mai, which was one of the main terminuses.

We climbed higher. Switching back and forth even more up the mountaintop in the most unique set of tracks we’ve ever seen. It was pretty incredible to experience and amazing to think that this potter built all of this himself.

To pay for further rail extensions, Barry sold bricks to the community that he used for his retaining walls. He also used old beer bottles donated by neighbors after he posted ads in the local paper requesting people to drop off their used bottles on his front yard.

In 1994, Barry extended the railway from Hoki-Mai with even more reversing points, and a year later added additional tracks to Horopito, with overlooks to Coromandel Town and the Harbor. There, he built a trestle for the trains to park and a small shack that he used as a remote pottery studio from which Barry would demonstrate his pottery craft and talk with passengers.

Along the expansion, Barry protected the native bush, planted trees and worked hard to protect the land from ever being commercially developed.

Horopito was thought to be the last terminus, but that only lasted until 1997, when Barry became increasingly dissatisfied with the cramped space. Although Horopito offered a great view, it was not panoramic. Barry picked a flat ridge 750 feet above Horopito “as a site for a real terminus in the sky.”

So with that he got to work once again. He added a third tunnel and another bridge spanning 120 feet across an old slip and one more switch back. The first passenger train reached the fifth reversing point in 2001, and later, the final reversing point in 2003 that he named the EyeFull Tower because of its magnificent panoramic view over Coromandel and the Hauraki Gulf. As we pulled into the station and climbed the tower, a rainbow came into view over the harbor.

Sadly, Barry passed away in January 2016 at the age of 80. He is buried at his favorite spot on the Driving Creek Railway with a kowhai, his favourite tree, planted on top.