Underworld

Photograph: Howie Wilson

Dominion Post, April 2011 –

‘Marilyn is a hoot, which is handy for a train driver. Talking ten to the dozen, she regales us with tales as we clickety-clack through the rainforest on a narrow-gauge railway.

The engine’s name, she tells us, is Dorothy, a mighty 20 horsepower Kubota that usurped a 1955 Morris Minor motor called Cecil. Loath as I am to stereotype West Coasters as colourful and slightly crazy, Marilyn is both.

Sarah heads up the Nile River Valley at the northern boundary of Paparoa National Park, for a cave-rafting trip with Norwest Adventures.

[Extract (c) Bennett & Slater, 2011]