Oct 24, 2025 The Three Whales
The B&B is at the base of a huge hill that is part of a Māori legend.
Long ago, a mother whale and her baby swam into Tauranga Harbour. The two whales swam up the harbour and into Rangataua Bay. They found that the water was getting shallow and they tried to return to the deeper water but they became trapped.
They knew in which direction the ocean lay, they could hear the waves pounding on the beach at Omanu and Pāpāmoa, and they struggled over the mudflats of Rangataua trying to find a way back to the open sea.
Tired and thirsty they stopped on the eastern shore to drink from a stream at Karīkarī. The stream was magical and turned both the whales into stone. The mother whale was fixed there as a gently rolling hill (Mangatawa) gazing northward out to Pāpāmoa and the sea. The baby who had been nestled beside the mother was transformed to a lower peak (Hikurangi).
The father whale came looking for his family. He followed the same journey they had taken and he too drank at the spring at Karīkarī. He was transformed into the high rounded hill south of Mangatawa (Kopukairoa).
The foundation of the first house our hosts built about 20 years ago on the top of Father Whale hill. A fabulous view, but very windy!
Mother Whale is the forested hill in the foreground and the calf whale is the green hill on the right with hedged kiwi orchards at the base.
Way down at the base of the hill is their current house and the separate B&B with attached shop.
