This is a video of my home town with it’s Victorian buildings. I took it on a quiet Saturday of Queens Birthday Weekend.
The walk begins at Taupo Quay, Moutoua Gardens, crosses Ridway Street, skirts Queens Park, goes through Majestic Square and crosses the main street, Victoria Ave and then crosses St Hill Street to Cooks Gardens.
From Cooks Gardens I try to give you a view of Mount Ruapehu.
We walked back home via the lift which I couldn’t show you because my camera ran out of room, but here’s the Durie Hill elevator.
Below are some photos of downtown Wanganui.
Moutoua GardensCooks GardensVictoria Ave, I once worked in this building
Today’s walk was along the banks of the historic Whanganui River, from the town bridge to the Dublin St bridge along Somme Parade Anzac Parade. The stroll included Kowai Park, a wonderful children’s park, on the Anzac Pde side of the river by the Dublin St bridge, and the James McGregor Memorial park. This park contains an arboretum with a collection of trees dating back to 1917.
Starting off at Durie Hill, the suburb where we now live, we walked down the stairs by the Durie Hill Tower to the river. There’s a historic elevator inside the hill but the tunnel is currently blocked by a slip. The elevator was constructed during World War 1 and the flu pandemic 100 years ago and finished in 1919. It makes our suburb kind of unique in NZ.
Before roads, the river was the main route north. A fleet of paddlesteamers used to ply the river from Wanganui to Pipiriki and back. With a length of 290 kilometres (180 mi), the Whanganui is the country’s third-longest river.
Two riverboats have been restored, the Waimarie and the Wairua.
DawsonFalls sits at the top end of Manaia Road 14 km from Kaponga. The drive in is on a very scenic, narrow bush lined road. The best place to start is the Visitor Centre. Inside the Visitor Centre is the old Syme Hut, a reassembled mountain hut.
We did three walks, to Wilkies Pools, the historic Power Station, and the Dawson Falls.
The Dawson Falls Power Station is just down the road from the Visitor Centre.
The power station’s generator is the oldest in continuous operation in New Zealand and amongst the oldest in the world.
The generator was built by the General Electric Company of Schenectady, New York around 1899 -1901. While full details of its working life before coming to Dawson Falls in 1935 are not clear, it is thought that it may have been used in Tasmania, military camps in Wellington and to light the Wellington Cable Car system.
The Haigh Access Road entrance to the walk at was closed because of Kauri Dieback, so we began the walk at Stillwater. The tide was still going when we reached the beach and we had to remove our shoes and wade through the water – but the day was hot and our feet dried quickly.
We climbed through regenerating bush to a headland before dropping quite steeply to Karepiro Bay, to a restored historic cottage. Dacre Cottage was built in the 1850s by Henry Dacre, son of the retired sea captain Ranulf Dacre, who bought the Weiti block in 1848.
Unfortunately you can’t see inside the cottage because of vandals but there’s a photo of the interior in the link below.
The beach outside the cottage is a nesting site for endangered dotterills. Unfortunately the land next to Karepiro Bay is under development. We could hear the diggers from the cottage. I really fear for these birds, I know from experience from where I live at Snells Beach that the Auckland City council won’t stop development because of our shorebirds. I hope these new home owners don’t have cats. I love cats but not in fragile areas where endangered birds are nesting.
Maungauika/North Head is located in Devonport. This historic defence was placed on the northern headland of the Waitemata Harbour in 1885 to protect Auckland from a feared Russian invasion.
The explosion of Mount Tarawera in 1886 was initially thought to be the beginning of a Russian bombardment.
The underground tunnels and the oldest buildings on the summit, a cookhouse and barracks, still remain from this period.
North Battery
First protected as a reserve in 1972 when it was included in the Hauraki Gulf Maritime Park, the North Head Historic Reserve was managed by the Department of Conservation.
DOC no longer administers the reserve. Ownership of Maungauika/North Head Historic Reserve has transferred to Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau (the Tāmaki Collective) as part of Treaty Settlement negotiations.
Self guided walk: North Head’s Self Guided Walk introduces you to a complex of tunnels, guns, searchlight emplacements and otherfortifications. These date from the late 1800s up to the time of the Second World War during which time North Head was a major military installation. The numbers on the map in this brochure correspond to numbered markers on the track. Approximate walking time is one hour.
This is a local walk. I can see Kawau Island from my house.
We caught the Mail run cruise to Kawau Island at Sandspit Wharf and they dropped us off at Schoolhouse Bay. From there we took the walk to the Coppermine and then to Mansion House. We missed the turn off to the mine but I’ve included some photos from an earlier walk.
Kawau Island have a healthy population of North Island weka which we saw on our walk.
The Coppermine
A manganese mine was established on the island in the 1840s; shortly after, copper was discovered by accident. The mine had ceased operation by 1855. These are the photos of the sandstone copper mine ruins from an earlier walk in 2005.
MansionHouse
Mansion House, 2005Mansion House peacock, 2005
In 1862 the Island was purchased by one of New Zealand’s first governors, Sir George Grey, as a private owner. He employed architects to significantly extend the mine manager’s house to create his stately home in Mansion House Bay, now fully restored, in its sheltered sunny cove.
Governor Grey released wallabies and kookaburras on the island. I’ve heard the kookaburra who’ve established themselves on the mainland on an early morning walk while it was still dark.
Auckland City Council are intent on eradicating the wallabies. They’ve been blamed for destroying native bush and associated birdlife. I don’t agree because the wallabies aren’t predators and after a century there’s still an active kiwi and weka population on the island. The wallabies have been culled by shooting since the days of George Grey but the Council and DOC use poison which is cruel. Some of the islanders value the wallabies as part of the island’s history and as an attraction for visitors.
History
Kawau Island’s traditional name is ‘Te Kawau tumaro o Toi’. The island is reputed to have been settled by descendants of Toi and later by descendants of the crews of the Arawa and Tainui canoes.
Like much of the land, the island was uninhabited when the Europeans arrived. It had been abandoned by the Maori in the 1820s after a particularly bloody skirmish during the musket wars.
After protracted debate over ownership Kawau was sold in the 1840s to W.T. Fairburn of the North British Australasian Loan and Investment Company.
Copper was mined from 1844 until June 1852 when the mines were inundated.
Governor George Grey – soldier, statesman, explorer, philanthropist
George Grey governed New Zealand from 1845 to 1853 and enjoyed great mana with the Maori who he admired from the start. He reassured them that their lands were safe, but declared he would not tolerate neutrality among the chiefs. They must choose where they stood: with Britain or with the rebels.
He governed again from 1860 to 1868 but his reputation was tarnished in his second term by his policies in Taranaki, his invasion of Waikato, and the massive confiscation (raupatu) of Māori land which followed. The confiscations, in particular, caused decades of bitterness and deep division.
Confiscating land to pay for the war in the 1860s was a really bad idea, but in 1878 an offer was made to return the confiscated land to Waikato Maori. The offer was refused. See the note below the links.
As a scholar, George Grey was deeply interested in the culture of the Maori and when he retired to Kawau Island, he studied ethnography.
Over one of the bookcases in the library, Grey had inscribed the words: “Learn from the Past. Use well the Present. Improve the Future.”
He (Grey) took a scholarly interest in Maori language and culture.
Māori chiefs often alluded to mythology and wove proverbs and poem fragments into their speeches, the meaning of which was largely lost on outsiders. To better understand what was being said, Grey began collecting traditional poems and legends, proverbs and myths wherever he went.
After a labour of eight years he had the stories that appeared in his classic 1855 book, Polynesian Mythology, and Ancient Traditional History of the New Zealand Race, first published in Māori the previous year.
He was the author of Ko nga mahinga a nga tupuna Maori, London 1854; Ko nga moteatea, me nga hakirara o nga maori, Wellington, 1853; Ko nga waiata maori, Cape Town and London, 1857″ (Keith Sinclair (1990) writing in Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, Vol 1″)
The offer to return confiscated land to Waikato Maori
Note: In 1878 the Governor and the Native Minister went to meet the proclaimed king, Tawhiao, and made a generous offer, which included the return of all confiscated Waikato land not disposed of by the Government to Europeans.
The Government offer sat on the table waiting a response from the Maori king Tawhiao for a year, when a substantial official party, led by Governor Grey and Native Minister Sheehan, came expecting the completion of the agreement, and another positive step forward in putting an end to conflict.
Tawhiao refused to accept anything less than the return of all confiscated land. He turned down the Government offer, to general surprise and consternation, with a refusal to swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen.
Only 26% of confiscated land was returned in Waikato, compared with 64% in Taranaki and 83% in Tauranga.
What led to king Tawhiao’s intransigence? He’d been friends with Governor Grey. On Kawau Island King Tawhiao, at Grey’s suggestion, entered into a solemn pact that bound them both to keep away from the alcohol that threatened Tawhiao with disgrace. Source: The governor’s island
Omokoroa is a peninsula that peninsula which stretches from SH2 into the Tauranga Harbour. It is translated as the ‘place of the long lizard.’
The reserve has some fine old trees planted by the Rev Joseph Gellibrand who came from Tasmania with his wife Selina and settled here. The house that occupied the site burned down years ago. Their adopted daughter Elizabeth married Captain Arthur Crapp and in 1975 the Crapp family gifted the land to the crown for a reserve.
Not much is known about the pa on the headland. The iwi that occupied the area were the Pirirakau hapu of Ngati Ranginui. The great Ngati Haua fighting chief Te Waharoa and his wife moved to Omokoroa in their old age and died here in 1838.
The pa has a landward defensive ditch and some old karaka trees which were used for food.
Te Waharoa : When CMS missionaries made exploratory journeys in the Thames, Tauranga and Rotorua districts between 1831 and 1833, Te Waharoa expressed to them his desire to have an Anglican missionary resident at Matamata. In early 1834 a mission station was established at Puriri, near the mouth of the Waihou River.
This chief was a shrewd man. In April 1835 A. N. Brown arrived to take up residence at Matamata, and was joined by J. A. Wilson in July. The two missionaries negotiated with Te Waharoa for a mission site outside Matamata pā. Wilson recorded in his journal: ‘The old chief seemed unsatisfied with the offered payment, which consisted of blankets, shirts, spades, iron pots, axes, adzes, etc., and he made some shrewd remarks on the durability of the land contrasted with that of the payment. “These,” he said, “will soon be broken, worn out, and gone, but the ground will endure forever to supply our children and theirs.” ‘
Te Waharoa was quick to perceive the potential use of the literacy skills the missionaries taught, as a means of diplomacy to preserve the peace with Ngāti Maru. His son and A. N. Brown wrote letters on his behalf, and on 19 September 1835 a party of Ngāti Maru from the Thames district was welcomed to Matamata at a peacemaking feast.
Recording the death of Te Waharoa in his journal, missionary A.N. Brown remarked: ‘Waharoa was a remarkable character, fierce, bloody, cruel, vindictive, cunning, brave, and yet, from whatever motive, the friend of the Mission.’
Te Waharoa was a great-uncle of Tarore, a little girl who had been educated by the missionaries. Her death led to the Maori adopting Christianity. Tarore’s story begins where her life ended at Wairere Falls.
There are two walks from the landing, the talk to the right takes you to the place where Green Lake flows into Lake Tarawera. The walk to the left takes you to Maori Rock paintings. The sign by the Tuhourangi iwi is very faded but this is what it says:
The rock art was restored by archeologist Trevor Hoskings. In 2009 Trevor Hosking, of Taupō, received the Queen’s Service Medal for services to the conservation of historic places. Mr Hosking had been actively involved in the restoration and protection of historic places in the Taupō area for more than 50 years. He worked to ensure the protection and restoration of local sites of significance, including the Armed Constabulary Hall, burial caves on Motutaiko Island, Rauhoata Cave, the Napier/Taupō Armed Constabulary Redoubts, the Te Porere Redoubt, the Tarawera rock drawings, and the Opepe Canoe. Source: Turangi Museum
The Tarawera rock art is mentioned in his book A Museum Underfoot, page 137-140.
Walk: Rotorua 28
Lake Tarawera
Links
Rock Art
Rock art in New Zealand is generally associated with the limestone shelters of the South Island, but already the New Zealand Archaeological Association lists 140 rock art sites in the North Island, most in the central plateau region … There are differences. The North Island has more carvings, the South Island more drawings. Abstract motifs dominate in the North, more figurative forms in the South.
And there are regional variations. In Tokoroa and Rotorua, drawings and carvings of waka are common—the best known being the vivid armada drawn in red on the edge of Lake Tarawera—while in Taranaki, the spiral, circles and other “classic” Maori motifs predominate.
The village of Te Wairoa was established in 1848 by Christian missionaries as a model village. It was buried in the 1886 eruption.
This stone pataka was one of the first structures to be excavated. It was discovered by Vi Smith, the landowner while they were having a picnic by the Te Wairoa stream.
Stone pataka at the Buried Village, Te Wairoa
The pataka is much older than the village structures and was probably built by the first people to live in the lakes area. See my post on Lake Okataiana.
There’s another stone pataka on the south-east shore of Green Lake, near the former village of Epiha.
The park contains a historic house, a lovely patch of bush on the headland, an old pa site and a beach lined with old Pohutukawa trees.
There’s a choice of three walks, we chose the perimeter walk. It’s not flat but there are great coastal views of the Hauraki Gulf when you climb the hill to the old pa site.
The pa was called Kakaha Pa. All that can be seen is an overgrown defensive ditch. Like so many Maori settlements and pa in this area, it was raided by the better armed Ngapuhi of Northland and the local tribe was decimated.
The pou at the start of the walks
The head of the pou represents rangitira (chiefs) who have stood on this land. The outer shell represents the many waka (canoes) that have landed on these shores. The two embracing and intertwining figures on the other side represent husband and wife, and arranged marriages to form alliances or settle differences. The natural splits in the log represent two awa (rivers) that run either side of Wenderholm – the Waiwera and Puhoi Rivers.
A toka (rock) has been places in the mouth of Waiwera representing the motu (island) named Mahurangi.
This is another walk not far from where I live.
Walk: Auckland 1
History
For centuries two small iwi, Ngati Rongo and Te Kawerau a Maki, occupied Maungatauhoro and its environs. Te Kawerau a Maki eventually migrated south, into the Waitakere Ranges; Ngati Rongo remained. In 1825 Hongi Hika brought his army of muskets down into Tamaki Makarau, through the rohe of Ngati Rongo. The local rangatira Murupaenga confronted Hika’s men with only a stone patu. Murupaenga died skirmishing in the Mahurangi River, which flows into the sea a few kilometres north of Maungatauhoro. He is buried on the hill, along with many other tupuna. Source: Waiting in the wood
Ruapekapeka Pa is the site of the fourth and last battle of the Flagstaff War, a series of battles between the Ngapuhi tribe and the British. The conflict was between Ngāpuhi chief Hone Heke and the British Crown over how the Treaty of Waitangi was to be interpreted.
The chiefs signed the Treaty in 1840 to end their inter-tribal conflict (see below) but the original intent has been forgotten. (Now there’s confusion over New Zealand’s founding document as it has become heavily politicised.)
Hone Heke ruled at Russell (Kororareka) and owned many slaves. Trouble started when the capital of New Zealand was moved to Auckland (see below) and the Governor-in-Council imposed a customs tariff on staple articles of trade, that resulted in a dramatic fall in the number of whaling ships that visited Kororareka. This caused a serious loss of revenue to Ngāpuhi. Heke then rebelled and he kept chopping down the flagpole at Russell.
The Maori were formidable fighters and the British never really won against Hone Heke. In the case of this fourth battle, Ruapekapeka Pa was taken while the Maori had temporarily left it empty.
After the Flagstaff War, Ngapuhe were left alone and consequently parts of Northland have lagged behind ever since.
The Treaty of Waitangi: On 20 March 1840 in the Manukau Harbour area where Ngāti Whātua farmed, paramount chief Āpihai Te Kawau signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi, the Treaty of Waitangi. Ngāti Whātua sought British protection from Ngāpuhi as well as a reciprocal relationship with the Crown and the Church. Soon after signing the Treaty, Te Kawau offered land on the Waitematā Harbour to William Hobson, the new Governor of New Zealand, for his new capital. Hobson took up the offer and moved the capital of New Zealand to Tāmaki Makaurau, naming the settlement Auckland.
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