TAI-TAMATANE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 260, 2 November 1935, Page 1 (Supplement)

TAI-TAMATANE.

WEST COAST TALES. y ' — WHATIPTT TO MtTBIWAI. (By F.C.J.) "0, east is east, and west is west, and never the twain shall meet," wrote Kipling about peoples'. He might have written the same with more obvious truth about the two sets of beaches, the one on the east coast near Auckland, and the other on'the wast. It is a matter a prevailing wind.. The<Maori name for the east coast is significant; it is "Tai-Tamatane" —the man-like ocean. Into the serenity of the east coast Inlets, .-ho wild white horses shoulder a rough unheralded way, to end the mad race of. a thousand miles in spouting foam at the cliff-foot. On the other coast the sound for ever ringing in the ears is the thunder of breakers. The west coast, with the exception of the main harbours, is relatively straight. It starts off with a so-called Ninety-Mile Beach; and long beaches become the habit. Some mighty god in ancient days thought that the long, sun-filled quiet fiord-reaches of the calm coast could not be tolerated on the other. So he breathed from the west, and he carved a coastline in hard open curves.

But let it not be- said. that the wild coast lacks a charm. Here is vibrant

life; here is untamed grandeur; here is the elemental. And so, long before there was a road over the Waitakeres on tvhich you drive your luxurious motor car and go picnicking in immaculate cream trousers, the west coast was known to the more appropriately attired enthusiast. To these, the pioneers, every mile of the long lift over the ranges was known, far better than it will ever be known to the motorist. The pioneers were the ones who knew the easiest way to that stately kauri grove beyond the ford at the Cascades; they knew the points of the ranges by pet names not found- on any map; they knew the short cuts, the bypaths, where at times you go through a tunnel of green on the floor of white, at best, the sunlight is a chequer of light and green shade.

The Maori Legends. It was this generation, too, who knew the Maori legend and history of the dfstrict. They knew the point on the Huia Road, just past Titirangi,-where there is still a half-finished Maori canoe, left as it was when' the raids of Hongi from the north made the Ngati-Whatua fugitive. They knew the stories about the beaches themselves. They knew the tramp from Whatipu, near the heads, up to Muriwai almost as the palm of their hands,' for this was a favourite walking tour. In those days young men and women did not call the good old homely sport of tramping by this parvenu mime "hiking."

The launch from- Onehunga begins the holiday. It runs'to Whatipu; and there Maori history begins. The tour will go through the Waitakere district, over country in which pas used to abound, over country which has ofjJ.en known sudden death and the sound of battle. The very name.Waitakere is suggestive of the country, ravine and. alternate spur, like a troubled sea. It means "waters, bubbling and tumbling," perhaps in cascades; and

those who know the noble fall of water at the place of that name, those who have shivered in the rock &£ the mouth of the water hole before diving into the bluegreen cold water, will understand the appropriateness of thcfname.

The most ancient inhabitants of the district of whom tradition speaks were the Kawerau, a peace-loving people, whose worries in life were few in a land of birds and fruitful valleys. They knew as their boundaries on the coast, Paratutai, the north head of the Manukau— just as you land from the launch at Whatipu—up to the south head of the Kaipara, Waionui. The Road to Piha. From Whatipu the way lies along the beach to Karekare; but few go without interruption to the latter place. The many must needs stop awhile, swing heavy pack from shoulders, and make up the Pararaha gorge. It looks inviting, even from the beach. It is worth exploring; it is worth clambering round the waterfalls; it is worth getting wet through to follow the stream; for this is adventure. i

Karekare is a fine beach, though one's personal preference is for Piha. Piha's hinterland is the more interesting—and besides the Maoris knew Piha and left their stories about it. Everyone knows the Piha stream, and many have done here as they did at Pararaha. But it is a good clay's march to follow the water to its source. At first the going is easy; but suddenly the ranges seemed to have closed down, grudging the little level ground they have allowed the beach to take from them.' It is there that the stream halts in its flow; it is there that the name Waitakere is justified.* The banks of the stream have narrowed in to become a gorge, and the bed of the water has become a series of pools, from which the overflow falls many feet to form another pool down lower.

One remembers one pool in particular. It was attained after a hard portage round the waterfall, with the sound of falling water very near, yet very far away. And there lay the pool, long and narrow between the ravine walls perhaps 50 feet in height. So close did the walls loom that the water was never entirely lighted by sunlight. The far end was ever shaded, and but little disturbed by the trickle of water from the pool far above. The surface was absolutely still; and it had the green-bronze look of- deen stillness. The air was moist, and there were few ferns. There was very little sound. Though it looked a first-class lair for a taniwha or a big eel. the party on that day decided that a dip was indicated. They stripped and dipped—and the' place was no longer silent. It was a case of in again, out again.- The water had not worn the bronze guise for nothing; it was intensely cold. Even though this was the middle of summer, the water was "straight off the ice." Warmed by no sun, disturbed by no' movement, shut in for e r er by rock, the pool had spent its time getting colder and colder—or so snid those who on that day disturbed the sPpncv The day was a repetition of s'-ch climbs; for the stream was & sucf-ssiort of such pools.

One looked . back and down on the beach. There was not a soul in sight— but that was years ago. Last summer one went -to the beach over a dusty .motor road. The beach was swarming with folk:- and then it was that one wished That the P'Vke of Gloucester had gone somewhere else than Piha. Pilia now is encumbered with .popularity and picnickers'waste "paper..

Lion Rock—A One-time Pa. There below was Lion Pock, a onetime pa; and the years fell away and it was besieged by a Maori taua. And this is the story. Towards the end of the seventeenth century the NgatiWhatua from tne. north invaded the home of the Kawerau. A chief, by name Kawharu, came down like a Maori wolf on the fold, and slaughtered his way from Te Henga and Anawhata —more of that later—until he came to Piha. There he besieged Lion Rock; and he slew the defenders. To this day anyone who cares to make the ascent may see the shellfish which the Maoris used for food in days. After Kawharu had taken Lion Rock he went on to Whatipu, where he took a pa on Paratntai.

Mention of Anawhata leads to a story of that little bay. Kawharu paused in his expedition to take two pas there. Perhaps he was flushed with his success at To Henga; but both these pas fell in one day, and he killed all the Kaweraus he could find. It was in his search for fugitives that he paused long enough to ravage yet another stronghold in the hinterland behind Anawhata.

Te Henga is better known as Bethel's, the name of some old settlers there. Bethel's has always been more popular than Piha, because it was ' easier of access. Everyone who has tramped the Glen Eden road to Piha knows the long, hard pull and the growing weight of food and sleeping bag; but the seven miles from the Waitakere station following the Waitakere Kiver valley is easy going.

Smuggler's Cave at Bethel's. There is an ideal smuggler's cave at Bethel's. It is along to the north end of the beach; and it goes right through one of the small promontories there. One entrance is through a little sandy pool which disappears into a slit in the cliff face. And then the adventure begins. The slit does not peter out. By dint of pretending one is a snake, one can struggle through :the part where the rock comes down almost to meet the sand — and then the slit becomes a cave. The rock ceiling, which was high enough barely to permit of passage lying on the ground, rises and broadens until it is like a cathedral. It must be 80 feet high. It- is spacious. Other smaller caves branch out; and the sand is dry, showing that it is above high water. The other end of the cave is at the furthest extreme of a long water passage, which comes out into daylight on the far side of the promontory. The water must reach' in half-way through the neck of land, so that one is standing on an underground beach.

When one speaks of Muriwai everyone thinks .of motor races. If those who have spent a pleasant day at those races would take the trouble to look at a hill that juts steeply from beyond the sand dunes, they would see a famous oldtime pa. It was called Korekore, and it crowned the hill, about 500 feet high. Very steeply approached, the pa -was well-nigh impregnable on three sides; and on -the fourth it was joined to the main beach range by a narrow tongue, easily defensible. But the Kawerau abandoned it before the advance from the north of Ngati-Whatua towards the end of the eighteenth century.

To be in the midst of things Maori one would need go up further than the Wa-i----takere ranges and to the western beaches. Better roads, too, are opening these beaches to the public, which demands a ready access; and it is safe to predict for them, and the bush which guards them round, a far greater popularity* There are some, though, who sigh at the, change.