Around Town and Te Mata Peak

Below is the view of Hastings, Napier and the Pacific Ocean from Te Mata Peak.

The legend of this mountain goes as follows:

Two chiefs from different Iwis (tribes) betrothed their son and daughter as children. When they were old enough to get married, the father of the girl told her that the man, Mata, was a tyrant and a bad person and that he didn't want her marrying him anymore. So she set off to try to deter him from marrying her by asking him impossible feats.

First she asked him: "Shape-shift into a bug smaller than an ant."

And he did, before her eyes.

Next she asked him: "Get me the biggest piece of greenstone that you can find within an hour."

Now greenstone is not readily found in the North Island, so he ran to the South Island and came back to her within the allotted time with the biggest and most beautiful greenstone.

She was impressed, but asked him yet another request before she would agree to marry him.

She asked him: "Make me the finest coat of koutuku(a legendary bird that was considered sacred because it was known to never set foot on the ground) within one hour."

He did as she asked and presented her with the most sublime of coats made by the most beautiful feathers. By then she had fallen in love with him, however, remembering what her father had said, she told him to do one last thing. She told him to turn into a giant and so he did. And she asked him to eat a piece of the mountain as if it were cake. As he did so, she cast a sleeping spell on him and he fell asleep on the mountain where he remains today.

If you look closely, you can see the head to the right of center and then see the body laid out from right to left. (I didn't take this picture, this is off the net Photograph by Basil Keane)

(This legend was told to me by Shani, I thank her for her knowledge.)


Below, some images of things in and around Hastings.

Showed you the microwave mailbox previously, here's a refrigerator mailbox!


fridge mailbox


flower bush

close-up of flower

These flowers remind me of the mimi flowers in Haiti. There used to be a huge tree of red ones at the old campus of Union School. Used to love that tree...