On the road: Travelling the land that time forgot ...

By TONY WALL

The hungry Holden chews up the kilometres, guided along the straight, flat, shimmering metal by red-tipped roadside markers that act like a blind man's cane.

This is Canterbury, where the roads seem to go on forever.

State Highway 1 meanders across the dry plains, bisecting small, unremarkable towns and cities that are virtually deserted.

Where are all the people? This is like the Land that Time Forgot.

Apparently, they have all run to the hills, holidaying in the lake resorts of Queenstown, Wanaka and Tekapo, leaving behind ghost-towns.

All that's missing are the tumbleweeds.

Out in the country, huge water sprinklers spurt their lifeblood on to the parched land with slow, majestic sweeps of their arms.

Fields are covered in hay bales like giant sushi rolls. The occasional farmer can be seen riding a tractor across his field, but you can travel for ages without seeing signs of life.

Only the continuous lines of traffic, steadily becoming thicker the further north you go, spoil the feeling of peace and isolation.

We pass the 45th parallel near Waimate, where a train has smashed into a truck a couple of hours earlier, and roll into Timaru.

When I trained as a journalist here in 1989, the place was a dump.

It felt full of white-supremacist biker types whose idea of a good night out was to burn a cross on the lawn of anyone whose skin was a colour darker than lily.

The gangs are still here, but the place is transformed. Downtown has been so well spruced up it is hard to believe it's the same city.

The sidewalks are impeccable and the old buildings have been given facelifts and turned into trendy cafes, bars and restaurants. The main streets are still festooned with Christmas decorations, and the whole place has a festive feel.

But the city is empty. Everyone is on holiday. It feels almost spooky walking around at night.

A meal at the flash Italian restaurant Casa Italia - we are the only ones there - and a quick beer at the Hydro Grand Hotel with its view of Caroline Bay, and it's time to move on. Forever northwards.

Just north of Timaru, at Seadown, is the property where the legendary racehorse Phar Lap was born. This is any racing enthusiast's Mecca, but unfortunately the monument to the great horse is an ugly limestone monstrosity that hardly does the champion justice.

An hour or so up the road, we come across a town that must be vying for the title of the country's most boring.

I still cannot believe that I lived in Ashburton for four years, writing for the local paper.

We stop only so I can relieve myself in the electronic unisex toilets - surely the best thing in town - and move on quickly.

A bit further north we come across Hec Henderson, aged 79, training three of his young horses in a paddock beside State Highway 1. Some of the best pacers are bred in these parts, and old Hec's produced a few.

At Rakaia, we check out the giant salmon - yep, it beats the trout at Gore - then drive up to the Rakaia River mouth, where a handful of anglers continually cast their lines into the sea and reel them back empty. It's bad fishing this year.

I'm starting to get excited because it's time to move on to Christchurch - my hometown.

Feature: On the road with Tony and Mark