The Tuia Mātauranga - Pōkai Whenua GeoTour: Whā follows the footsteps of early explorers of Aotearoa New Zealand taking you to places where leaders of the past searched for food, resources and ways to adapt and survive in this new land.
Use the Pokai Whenua GeoTour as your classroom to explore the stories of the past, in the present, to preserve what is unique in Aotearoa New Zealand for the future.
Collect the codewords to get the Geocoin puzzle pieces
To be able to complete this GeoTour and receive your special Geocoin collectable, remember to take a note of the codeword placed in the cache. This will need to be recorded in your passport which can be downloaded here.
|
63 of the 150 Pōkai Whenua GeoTour caches will contain a randomly placed special FTF token (a replica of the Tuia Mātauranga GeoTour commemorative coin). This is yours to keep! If you find more than one, you might consider leaving it for the next person who finds the cache.
Te Tauraka Waka a Māui is the name of the enclosed marae.
Its name means, the anchorage of Māui’s (the great explorer) canoe.
This was the first fully carved marae on the West Coast in 150 years and was opened on January 23, 2005, here in Mahitahi/Bruce Bay, South Westland, by the Kāti Māhaki hapū (subtribe) of the Kāti Māmoe/Kāi Tahu tribes.
We have a Māui story which differs from popular storytelling, but as our story has it:
Māui and his crew were paddling the southern ocean when a crew member mentioned he could see land.
“Kāo, he tiritiri o te moana,” (No, a mirage of the ocean) was the reply from Māui.
A few moments later again the cry, “He whenua, he whenua!” (Land, land!)
Again Māui looked but this time he had to admit, it was land.
They sailed closer but were stopped by two taniwha (monsters) Horo-makotipua and Horo-makopekapeka. Māui had to fight these two taniwha, which were tied to the north and the south of Mahitahi. He finally landed here, opposite the now marae, but he was scared off by patupaiarehe (fairy people) who were already here.
It is from here that Māui sailed around the southern coast and up to Kaikōura and into infamy for fishing up Te Ika a Māui, the North Island.
The hills behind Mahitahi, the Southern Alps, hold the name Kā Tiritiri o Te Moana in rememberance of the mistake of Māui. You can also see Aoraki from the marae.
The cache -
It's there, it's just NOT what it looks like.
Down low.
NOT inside the gate/fence/property
This IS a major highway, please watch children
Please, the enclosed space is private property, there is no need to enter, unless of course you are invited to do so.
Has been muggled so kindly take a photo of the cache and send to me for the key word until it can be replaced.. No photo No keyword