• Provincial Growth Fund Feasibility Study

Taken from the Feasibility Study for the new spa project.

"Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu have occupied Te Aroha since ancient times and held the mana over mountain, hot springs and surrounding whenua. The mountain and hot springs are sacred to the tribe, a taonga.

Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu consider Mount Te Aroha to be wahi tapu associated with their ancestors, particularly Te Ruinga. A maunga tapu is a spiritual halfway station between this world and the next. In traditional stories, patupaiarehe inhabit its misty peaks embodying and intensifying the tapu nature of the mountain. The hot springs at the base of the mountain flow out of its heart, right underneath Te Ruinga’s later pa site at Whakapipi.

Māori tradition ascribes the hot springs to the taniwha, Ureia, who left the O-kiroire hot springs to gouge out the channel of the Waihou River. He is said to have taken several gourds of hot water from O-koroire to leave at various points, including O-kauia springs and Te Aroha which lie along the Hauraki fault line.

Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu have always used the waters – the cold water for drinking and the hot water for bathing and healing. For centuries, battle wounded Māori often repaired themselves in Te Aroha by bathing in the springs. During the Waikato Wars, many wounded warriors were brought to the waters for healing and recuperation. Māori were also reported to have been brought from miles around by sleigh to receive the benefits of the healing waters. Ngāti Tumutumu chief, Te Mokena Hou, hosted the Māori King, Tāwhiao, on numerous occasions in the 1880s. Tāwhaio bathed in the pools to relieve his rheumatism. Old warriors also used the waters to soak in to relive symptoms of rheumatism and old age. Diseases of the eye were treated by the colder springs.

Māori built clay walls to create bathing pools and dammed the water flow with rocks to regulate the temperature by controlling the flow of hot and cold water into the pools. Māori would also contain the water by using raupu.

Following three fiercely contested cases in the land court, the Crown acquired the Aroha block in 1878. Various reserves were granted back to the tribe in the block including the Omahu Reserve which was originally to include the hot springs. Just before the vesting, 20 acres around the hot springs were excluded from the reserve. Crown control of the hot springs was asserted through the Aroha block purchase and a number of pieces of subsequent legislation. Tribe members either hold the view that the hot springs were confiscated, or the hot springs were gifted by the chief Te Mokena Hou on the condition that Māori were to continue to have free unencumbered access to their waters (the latter being supported by documentary evidence). The perception of Te Mokena Hou of a joint partnership in the joint management of the hot springs was ignored by the Crown as it progressively sought to remove Māori from management and access to their taonga. The Waitangi Tribunal found that the Crown had failed to protect the traditional values and kaitiakitanga of Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu in Te Aroha mountain and hot springs and the management of these places.

Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu today still hold the mountain and hot springs sacred. The current structures and containment of the Mokena geyser have destroyed the wairua of the waters. Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu have been excluded from access and management of the waters, as promised by the Crown back in 1878 and yearn to have this remedied and the wairua of the waters restored."

Text kindly provided by Ngāti Tumutumu (September 2019)