Kerikeri isn’t all cafés and galleries; there are many significant historic sites in the area, including New Zealand's oldest standing European building.
The Northland town of Kerikeri has a long, colourful history. The area was home ground for the fearsome Maori chief Hongi Hika, who terrorised many tribes throughout the North Island in the early 1800s. Yet he was kind to missionaries - allowing Samuel Marsden to establish New Zealand's second mission station here.
The Kerikeri Mission Station, also known as Kemp House, is New Zealand’s oldest standing European building. Built to house the Reverend John Butler in 1821, this elegant wooden home has the protection of the Historic Places Trust. Nearby is the Stone Store, which dates back to 1832. Designed by Wesleyan missionary John Hobbs and built by an ex-convict stonemason from New South Wales, the store was meant to house large quantities of wheat from the mission farm at Te Waimate. When the wheat failed, the building was used as a kauri gum trading store.
The terraced pa site, Kororipo, above the Kerikeri basin was once a stockaded fortress, but not in European times. When the missionaries lived here in the early 1820s, it was the site of an unfortified village where some of Hongi Hika’s people lived. Today the pa site is protected by the Department of Conservation.
By Kate Malcolm