River of Blood

Epic adventures, survival and tragedy in New Zealand's own 'Wild West' frontier, the Waiatoto Valley.

Deep into the heart of the Waiatoto Valley on the savage West Coast is New Zealand's own Wild West: a place which may never really be ‘won’. Its pioneers, musterers, hunters and pilots of South Westland’s Haast District have had to face isolation, rugged geography and atrocious weather that's sometimes so bad for so long that the hair begins to rot from the backs of live cattle.

The folk who’ve lived there for three generations have been shaped by the land. Ranging from mountain exploration to epic two-week cattle droves through dense bush, wild rivers and over dangerous passes; from hacking an existence out of feral isolation to high adrenaline pursuits, this book encompasses often poignant, sometimes bizarre, tales of tragedy and dogged survival.

It's a book for all those who are gripped by West Coast lore, and for adventurers of all kinds — pilots and bushmen, hunters and fishermen, stockmen, musterers and drovers alike, boaties, trampers and mountaineers.

River of Blood gives us the sense of people living by their wits, and with fearsome grit. A place that, even now, fits the label ‘The Last Frontier’.