Greymouth, Grey District, West Coast Region, New Zealandi

Regional Level Types
Greymouth	Town
Grey District	District
West Coast Region	Region
New Zealand	Country

This page is currently not sponsored. Click here to sponsor this page.

PhotosMapsSearchMineralogy

Former gold rush area.

Greymouth is the largest town on the west coast of the South Island of New Zealand. With a population around 10 000 do not expect traffic jams. It is sited at the entrance to the Grey River, named by early explorer Thomas Brunner in 1846, after a 19th Century New Zealand politician, Sir George Grey.

The town was established after gold rushes to the region, initially in this area, the beaches in 1865, just south of Greymouth. Gold along the coast was very fine and mixed with sand. Nuggetty gold was found across the 1870's and 1880's inland, and while substantial for a time, eventually faded. Major dredging operations were conducted for gold along the Grey River, its tributaries, neighbouring alluvial flats, and shoreline deposits, starting in the 1890's, until the end of World War Two, with limited operations until recent times.

After gold faded, coal became king. Initially mines were developed to feed gold stamp batteries, but subsequently the mines were developed for the export market. The Brunner Mines, site of the original coal discovery in the area were the first to develop, starting in the 1860's, and gradually ramping up in the latter part of the 19th Century. Other underground coal mines followed, often state owned, especially in the areas east of Dunnollie, along the Seven Mile Creek, and at Blackball. From the 1980's, open cut coal mines were developed, like Strongman, and some underground until the final coal mine closed (Roa) in early 2016.

The coal mines were an exclusively male domain, physically exhausting, hard drinking, hard living, highly unionised, with a strong bond of mateship, and often conservative views of the world. It was a dangerous job, with over 400 men killed in coal mines across the region, with many multiple fatality incidents involving the explosion and igniting of methane gas. The last was the Pike River disaster in 2010 which killed 29 miners.

Greymouth looks like it stopped in 1970, and to a certain degree it honestly reflects its economic fortunes. The gold had run out, the world has moved to cleaner energy, timber is locked away in conservation reserves, dairy farmers get fined huge amounts for polluting waterways. The town looks to service industries and tourism, but the hole left when high paid mining jobs ceased is yet to be filled.

And this is precisely why you should go to Greymouth. Few tourists come here, and if you experience the maddening crowds of Queenstown first, you will have a new appreciation of what the west coast can offer. This is the place to wander alone along a storm ravaged beach with giant driftwood, the biting chilling wind at your face; drive along coastal drives with sea stacks; hike into primeval beech rainforest amongst tree ferns and moss, and of course view mining history. The most easily accessible is the Brunner Mine, Blackball, Woods Creek, and the tourist attraction of Shantytown Heritage Park (located 10 km south of Greymouth; the town was constructed and opened in 1971 and consists of 30 re-created historic buildings making up a 19th-century gold-mining town.

Commodity List

This is a list of exploitable or exploited mineral commodities recorded from this region.

Mineral List

Mineral list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities

26 valid minerals.

Rock Types Recorded

Rock list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities