Kohi Walkway

21st June 2010

By Maurice Boniface

Ken said that it is three years since we did the Kohi Walkway, which goes along the coastline between Whakatane and Ohope Beach.  I went to Maungatapu and took Norma and John in my car, while Ken had Dave, Graham and Terry.  We drove to Ohope and dropped off the others to walk along the beach towards the start of the Walkway, while Ken and I went back to Whakatane and left my car at the bottom of Hillcrest Road, then drove back to the car park at the end of West End Road, getting there just before the others!  We all walked along the beach and stopped to look at a couple of houses that had been half demolished by a slip that had come down the cliff right behind them.  There have been two terrible storms in this area about a month ago, in fact half of Whakatane was flooded and a lot of homes were surrounded by water, so we presumed this had happened then.  Looking along the beach to where the Walkway commences, we could see that a huge slip had come down where the start of the track used to be.  When we got up closer, we could see that they have made a new track across the bottom of the slip.  We went up there and started on the first of the series of steps that characterise this Walkway - every now and then there is another lot of steps, some wooden and others earth with wooden risers.  In fact Norma counted all the ones going up and lost count when she was in the nine hundreds, while Dave counted all the down ones and got up to five hundred so there were nearly 1,500 steps on the track!  When we got up to the top of the cliff face we stopped for morning tea.  There is a lookout here and we looked down along the beach and what a lovely scene it was.  The sun was shining and the waves were rolling onto the sand while the houses nestled in along the base of the tree lined hills.  Down below us were six surfers in their wet suits, floating on their boards, waiting for the big wave to come.  I rang Mum and got a good clear signal.

Just as we were about to set off again a chap with an orange jacket came up the track. He said he was coming to check on a slip a bit further along on which he had cut some new steps and contractors were supposed to have come in and put the wooden risers on them.  He said he works full time for the Council but they employ contractors to do some of the work.  I took a photo of him and told him I write a story about our tramp.  He said to write a report to the Council on the condition of the track!  We got to the slip shortly afterwards and found that the risers were all in place. The chap told us that there had been a race over this track last weekend.  We passed quite a few people running along it during the day as well as others walking it.  The track then goes down to Otarawairere Bay and onto the beach which we walked along. It was very pleasant walking along the sand in the sunshine with the waves nearly coming up to us as we went along.  We passed a huge old Pohutukawa Tree with its branches even going down into the sand.  Turning around and looking back I could see the line of huge rocks going out into the sea with a lone tree right on the top of one of them.  I had taken a photo of it three years ago and used it in my story and wondered how it could survive on a bare rock with no soil, but it is still going!  Dave was in front of us ones at the back and we saw him stop and pick something up and when we got a bit closer it was a piece of drift wood in the shape of a bow, so he picked up a straight  piece for an arrow and pretended to shoot it for me to take a photo!  The beach then comes to the rocky part and when the tide is in you can't get along here at all.  This is why we started at Ohope - we usually go the other way but the tide would have been in when we got to this point had we done so.  Even so it was coming in quite fast and when we got to the part furthest out we had to go up near the cliff face to get past.  Being me, I went down onto the sand and took a photo of the water and the wave came right up to my boots as I clambered back onto the rocks!    At one point there were two rocks with sea coming up between the them and they met in the middle above it, making a bridge, so Terry stood on it while I took a photo.  We crossed a stream coming down across the beach then came to some steps which go up the side of the cliff.  At one part there was a chain to hold onto as you go up.  When we got up further we looked back along the Bay which again was a very pleasant scene.  In the middle of the bay there was a red buoy - John told us that it marked the spot where Moko, the bottlenose dolphin used to sleep when he was near Whakatane last summer.  He loved swimming with people and John said Maureen went swimming with him once.(If you want to see more about him, visit the website "Moko the Dolphin".)   Up a bit higher we looked back along the coastline and the Bay of Plenty seemed to go right out into sea away in the distance as it gets towards East Cape. 

Shortly we came to a spot where there is a notice to tell you that just along from here is the last spot on the mainland where the Grey Faced Petrel comes to breed.  They can live up to 33 years and only come ashore at breeding time which they do in burrows, so you are not allowed to go along there. Dave said they are also called Mutton Birds and that Maori like to eat them.  He has tried them and they are very fatty and taste of fish!  There was one of their burrows on the side of the track. By this time we were getting pretty warm and some of us had to take off our top layer of clothing.  Terry pointed out some Pine Trees on the side of the hill which were going yellow.  A chap who was passing said he had seen the workmen drill a hole in them and pour in poison, they are wild pines and they don't want them spreading through here.  Along the track there were pink markers with things like N 10 on them.  This area has been made into a Kiwi Reserve so they have been trapping rats, stoats, weasels etc so they don't eat the Kiwi eggs and young ones. We were coming around the coastline a bit further and the vegetation was now more open and alpine, so we were getting views of Whale Island which isn't very far out. We got to the place where you can go on a side track to look at Kohi Point which the track is named after.  It is too steep to go down to it and there is no track.  We were now around the point and the Whakatane river comes out at the base of the ridge were were on.  You can look away along the coast going north and it is a long beach with the settlement of Beachland just along the coast.  Whakatane looked very pleasant in the sun with the river running alongside and the boats moored along its bank.   There were several lookout spots as we went along the track.  I will attach a photo of Whakatane with the boats moored along the river.  The mountain in the background is Mt. Edgecumbe and just to its right, in the haze, you may be able to make out Mt. Tarawera. Whakatane's airport is right down by the sea several kilometres north of the town and there was some discussion about where it might be. After a while we came to a sign board with a drawing of a Maori Pa as they imagined it looked 300 years ago. It showed the wooden stockade around the perimeter and a kumara garden outside of it.  The name of the Pa was Taumata Kahawai and was 250 metres long, the biggest Pa in the area.  Alongside it was a communications tower, Laurie said it was a radio telephone one. It was now nearly twelve o'clock and as this was a nice sight, out of the wind, we decided to have lunch.  I rang Mum and again it was very good reception.  I sent a text saying lunch at the Taumata Kahawai Pa site.  I got several replies but noone asked where it was!

We set off down the track again and passed a huge Pohutukawa Tree in the middle of the bush.  Looking down to the river below at one of the lookouts we could see a statue on a rock at the river mouth. A bit further along the track Dave pointed out some round holes on the side of the track - he said he thought they had been made by Kiwi with their long beaks, trying to get at grubs under the ground but it was pretty hard soil here.  We came across several big round fungi on the track edge which grow into puff balls later on.  We came to a sign Kapu Te Rangi ( Toi's Pa) so decided to go up and have a look at it and found a lovely mown grass area with splendid views all around - a great place for defending your Pa against marauding tribes. There was a Maori carved statue and rocks with plaques on them telling you about the history etc. There is a car park a bit further over and you can get here from the Ohope road. Looking through the trees towards the sea we could just make out White Island in the haze.  Carrying down the track we came to a bridge and on the other side was a lookout to a waterfall that goes down to near the commercial area of town. The track comes out onto the road and looking straight down I could see my car in the car park below.   We went to the lookout where we often have morning tea when we go the other way and had a look at the scenes below and then across to another reserve to see some more.  We finally came to the steps that take you right down to the street near the car park.  We found that they have made the world's first Vertigraph - it is pictures, painted on tiles which are then glazed, of the local flora and fauna from the bottom of the sea right up to the sky put onto the risers of each of the steps as you go down.  Terry and I took several photos of them.  We got down to the street and walked along to the car,had afternoon tea then Ken came with us back to Ohope and went back to pick up his lot while we went on home.  I got there at 4.25 p.m. - much better than last week!