Bringing Waipa’s past alive
Waikato writer Kate Monahan-Riddell explores the history of Waipa’s most picturesque and significant sites. Here is the the first of six Te Ara Wai Journeys.
There’s stories of bloody battles for sovereignty and self-determination, of bravery and tragedy, of fortitude and resilience, and of innovation and entrepreneurship buried in the landscape of Waipa.
Many have largely been hidden – until now.
But a new new digital storytelling project, Te Ara Wai Journeys, is bringing them to a new audience. Using their mobile phones, visitors using the Waipa¯ District Council developed can take one of six self-guided tours of culturally and historically significant sites, from lake walks and hill climbs to battles sites and early settlements.
Told in both English and Ma¯ ori, there are 169 short stories featuring historians, military experts, archaeologists and local kaumatua with direct links to historic events. They focus on six key areas: Cambridge, Kara¯ piro, Pirongia, Nga¯ Roto, Kakepuku and Rangiowhia to O-Ra¯ kau.
For locals and visitors alike, Te Ara Wai Journeys is an educational and rewarding exploration of our backyard, revealing Waipa¯ history from the perspective of both Ma¯ ori and European settlers. The selfguided tours can be accessed via a mobile-friendly website, www. tearawai.nz. Each journey takes around two hours, but can easily become a half or full day trip with a picnic lunch or cafe´ stop or detour along the way.
It is part of a long-term plan to tell Waipa¯ stories, including the New Zealand Land Wars, through Te Ara Wai, a museum facility due to open in Te Awamutu in 2022. The council has committed $7 million to building the museum, which is still in the design stages, and a further $3.6 million over 10 years in Waipa¯ ’s significant cultural and ecological sites, so they can become visitor attractions and boost the district’s economy.
Waipa¯ Mayor Jim Mylchreest said there was a strong interest in local history from locals as well as tourists.
‘‘New Zealanders are thirsty for knowledge about our own history and this goes part of the way towards filling a huge gap,’’ he said.
EXPLORE CAMBRIDGE
Kids in tow and mobile phone in hand, we arrived at the first stop on our self-guided mobile tour of Cambridge, Lake Te Koo Utu.
Just across the road from St Andrew’s Anglican Church, the lake is a hidden oasis just minutes from Cambridge’s central business district.
Large signboards in both English and Ma¯ ori give a brief background on the town and its history, and a QR code takes us to the Te Ara Wai Journeys website (www.tearawai.nz) to listen to stories from historians, military experts, archaeologists and local kaumatua.
Through the words of Rahui Papa, John Bishop, Ann McEwan,
Greg Gasgoine, Grant Middlemiss, Nigel Te Hiko and Chris Lewis, history comes to life.
The lake was formed around 1800 years ago during the last major eruption of Lake Taupo¯ . It was once part of a thriving Ma¯ ori settlement, Horotiu Pa¯ , which occupied the entire Cambridge central business district (CBD). Generations of hapu¯ lived there until the British soldiers invaded the region during the New Zealand Land Wars of 1863-64.
Lake Te Koo Utu means ‘‘to scoop up water when washing one’s’ face’’ in Ma¯ ori, according to Rahui Papa, who is a recognised authority on local tribal history.
The lake was a pataka kai (food pantry) for local Ma¯ ori, providing eel, ko¯ ura (freshwater crayfish) and other native fish to hapu¯ and to visiting tribes. There was flax for weaving and bulrush for thatching.
The video narratives are supplemented by a slideshow of artefacts and a graphic novel on the Raupatu Land Confiscations, bringing the past to my fingertips.
We walk around the lake, watch the friendly ducks and visit the kids’ playground.
In July 1864 the town was established as a military settlement, known as Camp Cambridge. Around 700 soldiers from the Third Waikato Regiment, who had fought in the war, were based there. Each was given a section in the township and a 50 acre allotment of rural land to farm.
Over the next few decades Cambridge became a busy market town and a prosperous farming region.
The next stop on the tour is St Andrew’s Anglican Church, just across the road from the lake. It is one of eight historic churches in Cambridge.
A small church, built in 1873, still stands on this site. However, as the parish rapidly grew, a larger Gothic Revival style church was constructed in 1881, built from kauri timber. It has many striking interior and exterior features, including lancet arches and beautiful stained glass memorial windows, and a church organ dating from the late 1890s.
It is a short amble (14-minute walk) to the next stop, the Native Land Court on Victoria Street, but we jump in the car because little legs are tired from the lake walk. We stop outside the old court building (now the site of the wonderful Cambridge Museum) to listen to tales from the past.
The Native Land Court operated from 1866 through to the early 1900s, set up by the Crown to deal with serious disputes around
Ma¯ ori landownership after the war – including who the rightful owners were, and what compensation if any was owed.
The Crown confiscated a huge amount of land – 1.2million acres – from Ma¯ ori during the war, and the Land Court was a destination for Ma¯ ori advocating for their land. Many camped at Lake Te Koo Utu during prolonged court proceedings.
Unfortunately, Ma¯ ori did not usually benefit from the court process, which was biased against them in various ways (‘rebels’, those who had defended their land from Crown soldiers, were not viewed favourably by the judge, and the law didn’t acknowledge communal ownership by more than 10 people, which further disadvantaged Ma¯ ori). Chiefs and hapu¯ were pitted against each other.
Thus, many Ma¯ ori lost control over their ancestral land, forced to leave their homes, crops and whenua – relocating to other areas, where they lived in poverty.
This terrible history needs to be taught in school. The size of the confiscation and the unfairness of the process has impacted generations of Ma¯ ori and should be more widely known and understood.
The Cambridge Museum, housed in the old court building, is definitely worth a visit. It’s small but with lots of interesting and interactive kid-friendly exhibits.
The next stop is the riverbank just across the Victoria Bridge (a 10-minute walk or short drive). Waikato River was an important trading route for entrepreneurial Ma¯ ori, before the Land Wars.
The arch bridge between Cambridge and Leamington was erected in 1907, replacing earlier bridges that had been swept away in flooding.
The bridge was built and assembled in New York as a kit-set then shipped to New Zealand, transported by rail to Te Awamutu and dragged in sections across the swamp by bullock carts and put together 38m above the Waikato River. It spans 141m and helped open the region to economic growth. The perseverance and hardiness of the early settlers is admirable.
We jump in the car again and drive to a quiet cul-de-sac street, Athlone Drive, which backs onto the Waikato Expressway. A metal driveway leads to Horotiu Pa¯ , a grassed site overlooking the Kara¯ piro Viaduct Bridge. Today there is only a small remnant of the once mighty pa¯ , which was a safe haven for Waikato-Tainui. It included many smaller pa¯ dotted along the Kara¯ piro Gully from around the 1300s and much of the Cambridge CBD. Stories from kaumatua detail the importance of Pai Ma¯ rire spirituality in the region.
As European settlers made their home in Cambridge, dairying became important to the local economy. The final stop on the tour is just out of town at Pukekura, a small blink-and-you-miss-it building on the side of the road that was the Anchor Dairy Factory, established in 1886.
It was set up by Henry Reynolds, a Cornish farmer, who invented a butter that lasted longer than others.
It is interesting to hear about the early origins of farming in the region from Chris Lewis, whose family has been farming in the Waipa¯ district since 1864.
On that note, and in appreciation of the fruits of our dairy industry, we drove home to Hamilton via Punnet in Tamahere, stopping for a real fruit ice cream.
EXPLORE KARA¯ PIRO
Like many Waikato dwellers, I’d visited Kara¯ piro before, but I hadn’t given much thought to the history of the area.
It’s embarrassing how little I knew about the land and the stories of the people that came before us.
Te Ara Wai Journeys, which launched in December, is a fantastic resource to fill the knowledge-gap, and offers a great reason to get out and explore the outdoors with the wha¯ nau.
Over these past through weeks, as I’ve journeyed around the Waipa¯ region touring culturally significant sites, I’ve learned a lot about the geology and formation of the landscape, the early life of tangata whenua, stories from the New Zealand Land Wars, and the struggles and triumphs of Ma¯ ori and European settlers.
Te Ara Wai Journeys was developed by Waipa¯ District Council in conjunction with Te Awamutu Museum to tell the unique stories of Waipa¯ , a district rich in heritage and bursting with stories.
There are six journeys to take, focused around Pirongia, Cambridge, Kara¯ piro, Kakepuku, Rangiaowhia to O-Ra¯ kau and Nga¯ Roto.
Each journey takes around two to three hours, and features around half a dozen stops each. Visitors use their smart phones to access video stories, graphic novels and other narratives delivered by local historians, military experts and kauma¯ tua.
It’s essential history that all New Zealanders should know – it’s not only fascinating, but it explains so much about who we are today as a country.
Our journey around Kara¯ piro began at the Mighty River Domain, just outside the Podium Cafe´ .
Kara¯ piro is home to the Kara¯ piro Dam, a hydroelectric dam which opened in 1947, one of eight dams on the Waikato River generating power.
Today the lake is a popular site for water sports and recreation, hosting major international rowing regattas, as well as other events and conferences.
However, beneath its smooth waters Kara¯ piro holds many interesting stories from the past, some of them dark.
At the first Te Ara Wai Journeys sign board, there is a map and a brief background on each of the five stops, in English and Ma¯ ori. I hold my smart phone camera up to the QR code, which takes me to the mobile website tearawai.nz
I grab a drink and listen by the cafe´ , watching rowers skim across the lake while the kids tackle the playground.
Alan Hall details the ‘‘complex geological past’’ of the Waipa¯ district which, over time, formed its unique landscape of rivers, lakes, mountains, plains and wetlands.
A series of volcanoes emerged around 2.8 million years ago, stretching 65km from the coast at Karioi through to Pirongia, Kakepuku, Te Kawa and Tokanui.
Mt Maungatautari formed around 1.8 million years ago. Then, around 22,000 years ago the Waikato River, which previously ran from Taupo¯ to Thames, changed its course and flowed into the Waikato basin where it met the Waipa¯ River.
Rahui Papa tells us that iwi regard the Waikato River as a female ancestor, while Mt Maungatautari is the male ancestor – both are considered sacred tu¯ puna to Ma¯ ori in the region.
Papa says importance of caring for these natural resources are recalled in the words of King
Ta¯ whiao, the second Ma¯ ori King: ‘‘My river of life, each curve more beautiful than the last’’.
The second stop is a 10 minute walk from the playground, so we take a stroll along the Te Awa River Ride path overlooking the lake.
This is Te Pakanga o Taumatawı¯wı¯, the place where a fierce intertribal battle was fought in 1830.
It was the culmination of almost a decade of tensions between Nga¯ ti Haua¯ , the people of the area, and Nga¯ ti Maru, a tribe from Hauraki that that arrived seeking refuge from Hongi Hika in the early 1820s. After a few years friendship turned to friction when the visitors decided they wanted to stay, says Papa.
The battle revealed Nga¯ ti Haua¯ chief Te Waharoa’s strategic nous. He utilised his knowledge of the landscape drive the Nga¯ ti Maru warriors through gullies (now under the flooded lake) towards a steep cliff face, where fighting took place.
As Nga¯ ti Haua¯ warriors climbed vines up the cliff and another wave of fighters came from behind to defeat the enemy. It was one of the last battles to use mostly traditional Ma¯ ori weapons, such as patu (clubs) and taiaha.
Te Waharoa was worried his fallen warriors would be interfered with if there were a counter attack, so he stacked up the bodies and burned them on large volcanic rocks along the river near the battle site.
The name Kara¯ piro can be translated as the strong stench of burning bodies (piro) on rocks (kara¯ ), says Papa. These rocks were removed in the preparations for the 1978 World Rowing Championships, and a memorial now stands in front of the Sir Don Rowlands Centre in the Domain.
Listening to the story unfold on the banks of Lake Kara¯ piro, where it all happened, brings the history to life in a more visceral way than indoors at a museum.
My kids also enjoyed scrolling through the graphic novel of the battle on my phone, with beautifully illustrated scenes of the saga in a format which resonated with them.
Further along the path is the third stop, with tales about Ma¯ ori industry and enterprise in the region. A prosperous village called Whareturere existed between the river and Maungatautari around the 1850s, with flour and flax mills, a courthouse and a chapel. A flying fox was used to transport flour over a waterfall at Kara¯ piro, then transported up the Waikato River to markets in Auckland and further afield. Unfortunately, this commercially successful Ma¯ ori village was burned down by British soldiers during the invasion of the Waikato in 1863-64. However, Ma¯ ori independence and enterprise persevered. Later, a bank was established at Maungatautari in the 1880s by King Ta¯ whiao, the second Ma¯ ori King, to support the financial autonomy of his people.
The fourth stop looks out to
Maungatautari Mountain, a sacred landmark named by Tainui tohunga (navigating priest) Rakata¯ ura around 1200AD. Looking across the land from Mt Karioi, he named it Maungatautari: maunga meaning ‘mountain’ and tautari meaning ‘rock elevated above the clouds’.
Tumohe Clarke talks about the history and significance of Maungatautari, which has been a sanctuary and resource for local iwi over the centuries.
Today there is a 47km predatorproof fence around the mountain, managed by Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, to protect and develop native flora and fauna.
There are stories from Nathalia Jellyman and Craig Montgomerie about the ecology and regeneration of native species on the maunga including kiwi, tuatara, giant we¯ ta¯ and ko¯ kako.
It’s back to the car and a short drive back to the Outlook over Kara¯ piro Dam.
From this vantage point, you can see where the fortress Te Tiki o Te Ihingarangi once stood. When the British Crown invaded, iwi in the pa¯ saw a gunship coming up the Waikato River and realising the devastation it would cause, abandoned the pa¯ . It was subsequently confiscated, part of the 1.2 million acres of Ma¯ ori land (raupatu) taken in the Waikato region during the Land Wars.
A precursor to the Kara¯ piro Dam, Horahora Power Station opened in 1913, built by the Waihi Goldmining Company to power the mines. By the 1930s it was supplying power to much of the northern North Island (Waikato, Auckland and Bay of Plenty).
When the Kara¯ piro Dam opened in 1947 to meet growing demand for electricity, the Horahora Dam was flooded, and today lies on the lake floor.
When the two dams were built in the 1910s and 1940s, sites sacred to iwi were flooded, says Papa. These included pa¯ and whare, gardens and sacred places near the
river (such as caves which were burial places for tu¯ puna). While Pa¯ keha¯ were celebrating the Kara¯ piro Dam opening in 1947, tangata whenua were on boats retrieving the bones of their ancestors from the waters, which had floated up.
It’s just one of the grim but fascinating stories of Kara¯ piro, one that reveals much about the way society has (hopefully) changed.
An awareness and acknowledgement of history goes some way to address past wrongs, and I’m looking forward to a range of perspectives on New Zealand history being taught as part of the New Zealand school curriculum from 2022. Local history is up there as a ‘‘must learn’’ for our tamariki.
Te Ara Wai Journeys is a wonderful resource for anyone wanting to look below the surface of the Waipa¯ district – perfect for teachers and high school students. In fact, anyone who loves a good walk and has an interest in history, ecology and geology will get something out of this.