Coromandel

Most of the last entry was written in Coromandel, the name of both the tiny township and the scenically attractive 110-kilometre-long peninsula on the other side of the Hauraki Gulf from Auckland. It was named after a British ship which visited the area in 1820, and thus only indirectly after the coastal plain in south-eastern India.

From Auckland you can get there by road, first travelling south to Thames, the gateway to the peninsula. But a fine alternative is to take the catamaran ferry across the island-studded Gulf (Hauraki = ‘north wind’), with only the last stretch of the two-hour journey over open water. In some small way it is reminiscent of the Stockholm archipelago, although the islands are fewer and the yellow rock or volcanic scoria which sometimes rises steeply from the sea, the vegetation, the grass burnt beige by the summer sun, the sparkling turquoise water and special light of the South Pacific, are all very different.

The first discovery of gold in New Zealand was made near the Coromandel township in 1852 by a saw-miller. He immediately claimed the £250 prize offered for discovering what was termed a ‘payable’ goldfield and which it was hoped would stop people from leaving for the diggings in Australia or California.

The heyday of the community, which grew to be several thousand strong, was in the 1870s, but the difficulty and expense of extraction meant this was not a site for the little man dreaming of great fortune. Instead, large companies were formed, making much money for a time, before operations cost more than they produced, declined greatly in the 1880s and ceased altogether in the 1930s. The population dwindled and there is little to remind you of the golden past except for the former School of Mines, now a museum, a few other buildings and some (rather dangerous) mine shafts.

The other major economic activity in post-European-settlement days was forestry. As in many other parts of the north, this was once a wooded area dominated by that magnificent member of the pine family, the kauri tree. Slow-growing, it can reach a height of up to 45 metres and be as much as seven metres in diameter. It was greatly prized by the Europeans — the Coromandel came here in 1820 to acquire kauri spars — and alas there are few of the trees left. Kauri gum, dug from the ground where they once grew, was also much sought after, the resin being used in varnish, lacquer and linoleum.

Today, the peninsula lives by the holiday trade and farming. I am told there is gold in the seabed, but too difficult to get at.