Errol Vincent was a lifelong teacher and learner, always interested in exploring new ideas. Photo / supplied
Errol Vincent was a lifelong teacher and learner, always interested in exploring new ideas. Photo / supplied
Ōhakune man Errol Vincent will be remembered for his career as teacher, antique dealer, photographer and naturopath and as a prime instigator of the Ohakune Coach Road visitor attraction.
Vincent died in on May 27, and was farewelled on May 31 in the unusual double A-frame pole-house he had built.
Always a questioner and experimenter, Vincent had many careers and projects. He was first a teacher, then a bus driver, an antique dealer, photographer, and then a naturopath and osteopath.
He was a father of four and in his final years his main focus was bringing up his granddaughter, Holly Rose, born in 2012.
The recognition of the overwhelming success of the Ohakune Coach Road as a tourist attraction is largely down to him. It was he who researched and prepared submissions to the then New Zealand Historic Places Trust, which led to it being registered as a Category 1 Historic Place.
"He used to take delegations from the Department of Conservation up and show it to them," son Marc said.
He said it was exciting growing up in the house where Vincent would host visitors with alternative ideas, and remembers how much his father loved to socialise and entertain.
"He always had a really nice coffee machine and he would whip up his signature cheesecake when guests were coming."
Vincent was born in Gisborne in 1938. His father, Stanley, was an air force photographer during World War II - which gave his son a lifelong love of flying and photography.
At high school Vincent played the trombone, was a surf lifesaver, got his Queen's Scout badge and founded canoe and tramping clubs. After that he trained to be a teacher, in Wellington.
He spent two years teaching in Gisborne schools, before heading overseas in 1961. On the long ocean voyage he read a book about palmistry, and did readings for fellow passengers.
He taught in England, and toured both the United Kingdom and Europe, before returning to New Zealand in 1963. During another teaching job at Matawai School, north of Gisborne, he met fellow teacher Ann Bevan.
The two married at Taumarunui, in 1964, and worked in Auckland. They had three children by the time they moved to Ōhakune in 1972, and their fourth child, Marc, was born there.
Errol Vincent was an Ohakune stalwart and played a big role on making the Old Coach Road a tourist spot
In Ōhakune Vincent taught maths at Ruapehu College and bought 3ha of land near the town centre, where the couple initially planned a cultural retreat centre.
The family's 27 Tainui St house was built in 1976. It was self designed, with help from architects, and consisted of three units in a semi-circle, all facing Mt Ruapehu.
A progressive thinker, Vincent found the college leadership a bit traditional. He resigned from teaching and drove buses briefly, then he and his wife opened an antique shop called Any Old Iron in Ōhakune. Marc Vincent remembers the excitement when he returned from a Whanganui auction to unload his van of treasures.
"It created a real buzz in the town. People would gather on the pavement as he unloaded."
Then he started Solart Photo, taking and exhibiting his own photographs, developing films for other people in a converted haybarn and taking photographs of cadets for the army.
He got interested in alternative health, and by 1988 had qualified as a naturopath and osteopath. People came to the house for treatment and workshops.
"It was always quite exciting to be around," Marc Vincent remembers.
In 2003 Vincent began research on the Old Coach Road - a cobbled roadway used from 1906-08 by coaches taking passengers across a missing link in the railway's main trunk line. He found its remains on the edge of Tongariro National Park and tried to get the Conservation Department interested.
After the old road was recognised as a historic place momentum increased, funding was found and it opened as part of the Mountains to Sea cycle trail in 2010. Tourism is almost as big in summer as in winter now, Marc Vincent said.
