Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Oakura to Opunake
From Oakura, SH45 veers inland, with detours to sundry beaches along the way. On the
highway near Okato the buttermilk-coloured, 130-year-old
Stony River Hotel
( 06-752 4253;
www.stonyriverhotel.co.nz
;
2502 SH45; tw/d/tr incl breakfast $95/120/150, mains $10-28; lunch 10am-2pm Wed-
Sun; )
has simple country-style en-suite rooms and a straight-up public bar.
Just after Warea is
Stent Rd
, a legendary shallow reef break suitable for experienced
surfers (look for the painted-boulder sign: the street sign kept being stolen). Another fam-
ous spot is
Kumara Patch
, down Komene Rd west of Okato, which is a fast 150m left-hander.
A coastward turn-off at
Pungarehu
leads 3km to
Cape Egmont Lighthouse
, a photogenic cast-
iron lighthouse moved here from Mana Island near Wellington in 1881. Abel Tasman
sighted this cape in 1642 and called it 'Nieuw Zeeland'. There's a replica lighthouse off
Bayly Rd a bit further west around the coast, built to house the original Cape Egmont
Lighthouse light after it was automated in 1986.
The road to Parihaka (
Click here
)
leads inland from this stretch of SH45.
PARIHAKA
From the mid-1860s Parihaka, a small Maori settlement east of SH45 near Pungarehu, became the centre of a
peaceful resistance movement, one which involved not only other Taranaki tribes, but Maori from around the coun-
try. Its leaders, Te Whiti-o-Rongomai and Tohu Kakahi, were of both Taranaki and Ati-Awa descent.
After the Land Wars, confiscation of tribal lands was the central problem faced by Taranaki Maori, and under Te
Whiti's leadership a new approach to this issue was developed: resisting European settlement through nonviolent
methods.
When the government started surveying confiscated land on the Waimate plain in 1879, unarmed followers of Te
Whiti, wearing the movement's iconic white feather in their hair and in good humour, obstructed development by
ploughing troughs across roads, erecting random fences and pulling survey pegs. Many were arrested and held
without trial on the South Island, but the protests continued and intensified. Finally, in November 1881 the govern-
ment sent a force of over 1500 troops to Parihaka. Its inhabitants were arrested or driven away, and the village was
later demolished. Te Whiti and Tohu were arrested and imprisoned until 1883. In their absence Parihaka was rebuilt
and the ploughing campaigns continued into the 1890s.
In 2006 the NZ government issued a formal apology and financial compensation to the tribes affected by the in-
vasion and confiscation of Parihaka lands.
Te Whiti's spirit lives on at Parihaka, with annual meetings of his descendants and a public music-and-arts
Pari-
haka International Peace Festival
held early each year. For more info see
www.parihaka.com
.
Opunake
POP 1335
