More Info →Pukehou Hill Kapiti Coast

I use this shot as a benchmark to the passing of my mother-in-law the late Beryl. Ada. Mackie. Pukehou Hill lay down when Beryl lay down.Beryl was a queen in her own right, as local folk will nod to. Anyway, this was a weekend like no other! Absolute mayhem from the hills to the ocean, damage and chaos was everywhere. Newspaper reports stated flood patterns not seen since 30 years! The interesting thing about this photo was a scholar chap from down Otago university was sent up this way to research Pukehou Hill, and the question in moot was: "where did all of the soil go to when Pukehou fell like she did?" His findings were quite interesting; his theory is that: " the soils were totally washed away because there was so much rainfall that weekend near everything was awash.! " There was no damage to fencelines, nor soils along any of the fenclines along the bottom of the hills. I am familiar with this hill as I also worked on this Deer Farm with Rodney Lind, and lived in both farm houses at the foothills, she's a beautiful view from the top skyline by the way! It was here that I bumped into the scholar from Otago one day, we started chatting, and these are the resulting pics. This hill is also a historical site in terms of way back in the Mäori war times when Te Rauparaha and his people lived all through the district. The hill is known as "Ihaia's Leap" or, "The hill of Dedication" where local körero (talk), states a member of the Muaupoko tribe (Ihaia), was found up a tree as Ngati Raukawa people were travelling through that area. They gave him the option to jump; and if he survived...he may leave, yet, if he died...most unlucky in terms of the practices that were in place way back then! Thus; Ihaia survived; and as local talk would have it...this is one line of how the Muaupoko tribes numbers rose again through Ihaia who has direct lineage to the whänau Taueki resident throughout Levin. I do not wish to get into the politics of the actual matters here. This is just an overview of how the story has evolved locally, from whence I came, and no malice is intended throughout this text.