Noir

 Downstream from the bridge a concrete weir forced the water into a muddy pool. A pig farm upstream past the school pumped effluent into the river. A tributary flowed into the tidal pool through culverts carrying stormwater, petrol and occasional waste. At low tide the river shrank into a single channel leaving eels burrowed in the mud.

On the town wharf a diesel bowser stood ready to fill the motor boats and yachts arriving from the coast on the high tide. Towards the harbour the ruins of a cement works rose from the shoreline. The river opened into a harbour past an island with a sailor cemetery and a beach beside an old boarding house. At the mouth of the harbour a pā overlooked the beach from another island.

On top of the island pits and pōhutukawa spread towards steep cliffs on the seaward side. Beyond them large islands opened to deep green ocean and orca. All of it lay within the drowned crater of a vast volcano.

To the west of the river the town stretched north and south along both sides of the valley. Percy Street climbed the southern slope past four churches until it reached a farm gate.

Beyond the gate a farm ran south along the ridge towards a stately home and an abandoned house sitting among trees below the road.

The stately home stood beside a four-road intersection. To the east one road curved downhill past an abandoned mansion towards the river.