Boats and boaties

I became fascinated with the colourful history of the Whangaroa Harbour during my marriage.  My ex husband grew up in nearby Kaeo and one of my in laws had and still has strong connections with Totara North.

According to Maori traditions, the waka (canoe) Mahuhu-ki-te-rangi explored the Whangaroa harbour during early Maori settlement of New Zealand. The area was settled by descendants of Te Mamaru and Mataatua waka crews (circa 1350 AD).

But the harbour was not discovered by European sailors until relatively late, perhaps because the harbour's narrow entrance is obscured by Mahinepua /Stephenson's Island lying off its coast.  Captain James Cook passed by without detecting it on all 3 of his voyages to New Zealand.

The first European ship to call at Whangaroa harbour was the seal ship The Star in 1807. This visit was followed by an epidemic that resulted in the death of many Maori so they were not so welcoming to the visit visitors.

When the next ship, the Boyd, came along a couple of years later seeking a cargo of kauri spars, the local Maori took the captain and officers up the river for several miles (to show them some timber) to a pa site (fortified village) where they were surrounded, cooked and eaten (the Europeans, that is).

After the feast a warparty returned to the ship to kill the rest of the crew and in the battle a spark flew into a barrel of gunpowder and, with a tremendous explosion, the ship was destroyed.  So all 66 of the crew and passengers, with the exception of a woman and two children, were killed. 

Of course, there were repercussion, more people were killed.  Although European ships weren't keen on putting into the harbour for a while, eventually trade flourished as the Whangaroa harbour was an attractive place for ships to visit. It had bountiful timber supplies, fresh water, and a population capable of growing food for trade. A ship's captain in the early 1820s remarked, it was also "One of the finest harbours in the world, the largest fleet might ride in it, and there is not a wind from which it is not sheltered". Adding to his description of Whangaroa harbour's practical aspects, he went on to call it "a singular and beautifully romantic place". 

That much, at least, is unchanged.  

Totara North is still a place for boats and colourful characters.

They didn't mind at all when I asked to take their photo.

Totara North

I've spent the morning sorting my photos from the past month or so.  There are a lot of them, I've been up north twice and down to Taranaki as well.  I was distracted by the number of photos I have of boats.  Not surprising, New Zealanders have the second highest rate of boat ownership in the world.  When I got to my photos from Totara North, I went off on another tangent.  I liked the photos I took there, so decided I would post a few.

Any time I've been to Totara North, it hasn't been planned.  But it's just a few miles off SH1 and I'd promised myself some time ago I'd stop by again to get photos of what I thought was an old fish factory.  It's not, it's an old timber mill.  You can't miss it!  Looks like someone else couldn't either.

Totara North is a small township on the mid-upper reaches of the Whangaroa Harbour, north of the Bay of Islands.  It is one of the earliest settlements and was originally established as a source of timber, particularly Kauri, which was used for spars for ships, then for building European style houses in the newly settled land.

The steep bush-clad hills of this north side of the harbour tumble almost all the way into the sea and offer little flat land on which a town could grow, but Totara North's proximity to the sea, the kauri trees and kauri gum fields, allowed it to exploit its nearby kauri forests and to become a thriving and prosperous community.

In 1870, two enterprising young men who had just completed their apprenticeships,  Thomas Lane and William Brown,  built themselves a skiff in the Bay of Islands and sailed it north to Whangaroa Harbour where they set up their own boat-building business.

Lane & Brown built ships of up to 350 tons and employed up to 100 men and by 1900 over 70 vessels were built and launched at their yards. At that time, Totara North had over 100 children attending the school (around 40 today), three boarding houses, two stores, a bakery, a rope works, a brickworks and a post-office with telegram service.

With the decline of the wooden ship-building industry at the turn of the century, the firm expanded its timber milling business.  Kauri was sent to San Francisco to be used in the city's reconstruction after the 1906 earthquake.   Who would have thought?

 

The old mill closed in 2004 and today belongs to Te Runanga o Whaingaroa, a local Maori administrative body.  They don't appear to be using it at all.  Amazing how quickly something can fall into ruin when it is neglected.

Sitting out the front, quite close to the road, was this:

 A clue to the factory's current use, perhaps?  I wonder if it's still there.

I'll get back to the boats tomorrow maybe.