Waiuta

About

In 1908, just three years after prospectors had discovered gold, the Waiuta goldmine opened with a 563-meter-deep shaft. In 1926, work shifted to the adjacent Blackwater North claim and its Prohibition shaft, which reached a depth of 879 meters in 1938. The gold here was embedded in rock quartz, meaning it had to be drilled and blasted from the reef, trucked through the tulles, winched up the shaft, and then processed - a grueling process that produced 23 tons of gold from 1.5 million tons of quartz. In 1951, a tunnel collapse blocked the ventilation shaft, and as it was too much effort to repair, the mine was abandoned and the town’s 600 residents were forced to relocate. While the site has since fallen into ruin, a walking trail works its way past the 8 remaining buildings with informative signs shedding light on the town’s history and mining functions.