Waihi at Lake Taupo

Highway 41 passes to the west of Lake Taupo in the centre of New Zealand’s North Island and north of Tongariro National Park. To the southwest of Lake Taupo lies the village of Waihi, which is still home to a large MaoriMāori community. Many generations ago, a chief lived there, Te Heuheu Tukino IV, who determined the future of the sacred mountains with a far-sighted and wise decision. Until the mid-20th century, new immigrants from Europe were not only pushing to climb the mountains but were also claiming increasingly large areas for colonisation. The chief saw the danger that his ancestors and his spiritual centre would fall to the Pākehā and be divided up, just as other areas had been before. Therefore, the mountain peaks were to be gifted to the New Zealand government, and thus to all citizens of the country, on the condition that a national park be created from them. This gift led to the creation of Tongariro National Park in 1887, New Zealand’s first national park and the fourth in the world, following the origins of the national park concept in Yellowstone, USA.