The region with the 'peakiest peak' | Te Tai Tokerau Northland Update
A fun fact that emerged at a recent workshop co-hosted by Northland Inc and Tourism New Zealand – Te Tai Tokerau has the ‘peakiest peak’ in terms of visitor numbers of any region in New Zealand. Domestic travellers, international visitors, cruise passengers; all flock to the north for our beautiful summer, but then things can go a bit quiet ‘off-peak’.
While that can be seen as a problem, it also reflects a huge opportunity to extend our season into spring and/or autumn, and heritage tourism can undoubtedly play a major part in attracting more visitors ‘off-peak’. Many of our Tohu Whenua sites can be enjoyed at any time of year, in any weather, and in fact may be better appreciated at a more leisurely pace away from the bustle and crowds of summer. This was one of the things David shared with a U3A group he spoke with in Kerikeri recently. The group of 40 were keen to hear more about our network of sites and in particular how they all relate to each other - we hope they will be exploring them on and off peak in future!
David has also been catching up with the hard-working teams at our sites around the region and has some great updates about their creative ways to attract visitors, often in partnership with other organisations.
Te Waimate Mission recently hosted an astro-photography course, where attendees learned more about photographing the night sky (it gets very dark in the country!), and were treated to a candle-light tour of the mission house.
As part of the Bay of Islands Upsurge festival, Pompallier Mission and Printery offered ‘lantern tours’, with actors from Kerikeri Theatre Company representing and telling the stories of (among others) Bishop Pompallier, Mary-Ann Callaghan, and of course The Ginger Cat (one of the more famous evacuees from Kororareka at the time of the unpleasantness in 1845). It was good to see the number of young people who joined the tours and obviously enjoyed the ‘first hand’ accounts of those remarkable times.
Next month (October) will see the French Cafe at Pompallier and the Honey House Cafe at the Kerikeri Mission (Kororipo Heritage Park) joining in the fun of Savour Northland, our regional food and drink extravaganza. Look out for French-themed sweet treats, and savoury dishes using some uniquely Northland ingredients!
In brief, any time is a good time to visit Tohu Whenua sites, to learn more about the extraordinary people and events that contributed so much to our shared history.
Remember that if you have events planned at your Tohu Whenua site and would like us to give you a shout out on social media, you just need to let us know - tohuwhenua@gmail.com
Image by Grant Sheehan
