Mangonui Waterfront

Mangonui was a whaling and kauri-timber port from the 1830s, one of the busier harbours in the north, and the waterfront kept its nineteenth-century buildings when the trade moved on - a row of colonial shopfronts, a hotel and a boardwalk along the harbour edge with interpretation panels on the whaling and gum-digging years. The building everyone knows is the Mangonui Fish Shop, built out over the water on piles, where you eat fish and chips at tables above the harbour and watch for the fish being landed at the wharf beside it. Doubtless Bay itself got its name from Cook, who recorded that the inlet was doubtless a bay. Around the village are Coopers Beach, Cable Bay and Taipa, and the Rangikapiti Pa historic reserve on the hill above gives a view over the whole harbour and the terraces of the pa itself.

What you actually see

• The waterfront boardwalk - colonial shopfronts and harbour interpretation.
• The fish shop on piles - built out over the water.
• Rangikapiti Pa - terraces and a harbour view on the hill above.
• The whaling history - the port's nineteenth-century trade, explained on the walk.

When to go

October to April; January is the busy month when the fish shop queues. Any time for the boardwalk and the pa.

Honest expectations

The fish shop is a tourist institution and prices and queues reflect that. The village is small and quiet outside summer. Parking on the waterfront is limited.

Nearby

Coopers Beach and Cable Bay are close; Kaitaia and the Far North are west.