Guest: Brighton Beach, Dunedin, New Zealand

Brighton Beach, the fifth of this column’s guest beaches, is situated just 20 kilometers southwest of Dunedin, in the South Island of New Zealand. A rather idyllic settlement, Brighton offers expansive golden sands, gentle surf, and a family-friendly atmosphere as demonstrated by its annual Gala Day right next to the beach. As it happens, I have not only been to the place (diary entry below), but I have just learned that the renowned Kiwi poet James K. Baxter grew up in and around Brighton.

Brighton - with a population of about 1,500 - lies on the Otago peninsula within the city limits of Dunedin. It is connected by coastal road with the Dunedin commuter settlement of Waldronville to the northeast and with Taieri Mouth to the southwest. The settlement of Ocean View lies immediately to the east of Brighton, separated from it by a large bluff (simply known as ‘Big Rock’) which juts towards the ocean. The beach is popular for summer day trips from Dunedin; and, at low tide, visitors can explore tidal pools, and the nearby Otokia Creek which offers a scenic walking track through a nature reserve.

Nearby, the Beachlands Speedway in Waldronville offers stock car and saloon car racing events, while surfers can head to Blackhead Beach. In January, the Brighton Domain (a grassy area just behind the beach) hosts the community’s Gala Day, a family-friendly event featuring over 150 stalls, amusement rides, entertainment, and food vendors. 

The area around Brighton was not the site of permanent settlement by pre-colonial Māori, but was on their regular trails from their homes on Otago Peninsula to their traditional hunting grounds. Archaeological evidence suggests it was the site of seal and sea lion hunting, as well as hunting of moa. Stone tool making may have also taken place around the area. European settlement began in the 1860s. The town was named by an early resident, Hugh Williams, after Brighton in England. Early industries included coal mining, with lignite being plentiful at nearby Ocean View. 

As it happens, I lived in Dunedin for a year or so in 1975 (during my three-year long travels), and went to Brighton on two or three occasions. Here is a diary entry for one of those visits

September 1975: ‘Today I went for a little hitch-hike down a small coast road to a place called Brighton, a small village, and there I found a commotion as the people were standing around because a man in a power boat had been thrown out of it by the rough surf, for hours surf rescue teams and a sea place searched the rocky coast for the body and the tourists built up, cooing people and eager helpers, it all made me very sad. Then, when I got home, I had a phone call from someone who had found my kitten Ginquin because she had gone missing when I was away last week, so that made me happy again.’

While researching this article, I discovered that James K. Baxter grew up in the area. On his first day at Brighton Primary School (now Big Rock Primary School), he burned his hand on a stove, and, later, he used this incident to represent the failure of institutional education. Baxter is considered one of the preeminent writers of his generation, but he was a controversial figure (see Wikipedia), troubled by alcoholism and later converting to Catholicism and establishing a commune. He died aged only 46, in 1972, His Maori wife, Jacquie Sturm, collected and catalogued his prolific output of poems and plays, and managed his literary estate. 

During my travels, I was often to be found trekking along roadsides, hitchhiking, looking for my next ride, heading for the next unknown place. And I’d find myself reciting the same verse of poetry over and over.

Upon the upland road

Ride easy stranger

Surrender to the sky

Your heart of anger

High Country Weather (J. K. Baxter, 1945)