Tauranga and Mount Maunganui are the heart of beach life on New Zealand's North Island. On one side is Tauranga, a thriving, sunny city with the country's biggest port. Across the bridge is the Mount: a perfect volcanic cone (Mauao) at the end of a spit of sand, with what many consider the North Island's best beach at its feet. The view of Mauao rising above the golden sand is one of the icons of the Kiwi summer.
The star attraction is walking up Mauao, a mountain sacred to Māori, along its tracks to a 360° view of the ocean, the city and the bay. Afterwards you can relax in the saltwater hot pools at the Mount Hot Pools, or head into the surf. It's an area of surfing, long coastal walks, cafés and a relaxed, sun-kissed lifestyle that draws New Zealanders from all over the country, especially in summer.
This guide covers the best of Tauranga and the Mount with specific, verified information: how and when to climb Mauao, what the hot pools cost, where the best surf is, how to get to geothermal Rotorua an hour away, how to get there and how to get around by bus with the Bee Card. All so you can enjoy the Bay of Plenty, the 'bay of abundance', as it deserves. (Note: always check access to Mauao, as it can close after severe weather.)
The name Mauao ('caught by the morning light') belongs to the volcanic cone that watches over the bay. It is sacred to the Māori iwi (tribes) Ngāi Te Rangi, Ngāti Ranginui and Ngāti Pūkenga, who manage it through the Mauao Trust. The mountain was once a pā (fortified village), and you can still see the trenches and shell mounds (middens). In 1864 Tauranga, the 'resting place for canoes', saw the battles of Gate Pā (Pukehinahina) and Te Ranga, part of the New Zealand Wars, after which the Crown confiscated 290,000 acres of Māori land. The full story of Mauao, the iwi, the battles and the modern city is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The geothermal and spiritual heart of the North Island: the land of the Te Arawa confederation, where New Zealand tourism was born around the legendary Pink and White Terraces, destroyed by the eruption of Mount Tarawera in 1886. Here the geysers of Rotorua bubble away and the active volcanoes of Tongariro rise up.
Read the history of Bay of Plenty and the Central Plateau (Rotorua) →Some places make no sense on your own; with someone explaining them, they change completely. We look ours up on Civitatis: guided in Spanish and booked online with no fuss. They have 5 activities in Tauranga Monte Maunganui. Have a look below: tap any of them to see them all.
If you book from here we earn a commission and you pay no more. Prices and availability come from Civitatis.
No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
The volcanic cone that watches over the bay and gives the Mount its fame has a beautiful name, and behind it lies a story of unrequited love. It is called Mauao, which means 'caught by (or in the light of) the morning', and for the Māori iwi (tribes) of the Bay of Plenty it is more than a mountain. It is an ancestor with its own legend. Tradition says this mountain, which once had no name (it was known as Pōhokura), was in love with a nearby hill called Puwhenua, who loved another mountain. Heartbroken, the nameless mountain asked the patupaiarehe (forest beings, a kind of spirit) to drag it out to sea so it could vanish beneath the waves and end its sorrow.
The patupaiarehe were strong only at night. They began hauling the mountain towards the ocean, carving the channel where the Waimapu stream runs today. But the task was huge, and the sun caught them before they could finish. At dawn the spirits had to flee the light, and the mountain was left stuck forever right at the water's edge, at the entrance to the harbour. That is how it got the name Mauao, 'caught by the light of the morning': the mountain that was going to sink but was stopped by the dawn.
Mauao is a sacred place (wāhi tapu), and for centuries it was a strategic pā (fortified village) that controlled the entrance to the harbour. You can still see the terraces and trenches of the old defences on its slopes, along with shell mounds (middens) left by generations of people who lived there. Today the mountain is managed by its traditional owners, the Ngāi Te Rangi, Ngāti Ranginui and Ngāti Pūkenga iwi, through the Mauao Trust. It is a recognition that this cone is not just a tourist attraction but a living ancestor that you climb with respect.
The city's name, Tauranga, means 'resting (or anchoring) place for canoes (waka)', and it sums up its historical role perfectly: a natural, sheltered harbour, ideal for beaching the great voyaging canoes. The region was settled by descendants of several founding canoes that arrived from Hawaiki, and from them came the iwi who are still tangata whenua (people of the land) here: Ngāti Ranginui (linked to the Tākitimu canoe), Ngāi Te Rangi (who arrived later) and Ngāti Pūkenga.
The Bay of Plenty was, and still is, a generous land. Captain James Cook gave it its European name in 1769, as a direct contrast to Poverty Bay in Gisborne. There he had failed to get supplies, while here he found prosperous Māori communities, plentiful crops and trade. The sunny climate and fertile soils supported a large population, with big kūmara (sweet potato) gardens and a way of life organised around the coastal pā and the marae.
The first permanent Europeans arrived from the 1830s, most of them missionaries. A Church Missionary Society mission was set up in 1838, and in 1847 The Elms was built as the home of Archdeacon Alfred Nesbit Brown. Today it is one of the oldest houses in New Zealand and a museum. For a couple of decades, Māori and Pākehā (Europeans) lived side by side, trading and exchanging religious ideas fairly peacefully. But as in almost all of New Zealand, the hunger for land would eventually shatter that calm, and violently.
In the 1860s, New Zealand was being torn apart by the New Zealand Wars, the conflict between the Crown and Māori iwi over land and sovereignty. Tauranga was key, because its harbour was part of the supply network sending warriors and provisions to the Māori resistance in neighbouring Waikato. To cut off that flow, in 1864 the government sent troops to blockade Tauranga harbour, and the conflict reached the bay.
Ngāi Te Rangi warriors, led by the brilliant Rawiri Puhirake, built a pā (fortress) on a ridge called Pukehinahina, known to Europeans as Gate Pā. On 29 April 1864, around 1,700 British soldiers backed by heavy artillery attacked barely 230 Māori defenders. Then the unthinkable happened: the British suffered a humiliating defeat. The Māori had designed such an ingenious system of trenches and bomb-proof shelters that they survived the bombardment, and when the infantry stormed the pā, the defenders ambushed them and drove them back. 31 British soldiers were killed and 80 wounded. Gate Pā was one of the greatest Māori victories of the entire wars. It is also remembered for an act of honour: during the battle, a Māori woman, Hēni Te Kiri Karamū, gave water to wounded and dying British soldiers, an act of compassion that became legendary.
But the victory was short-lived. Seven weeks later, on 21 June 1864, at the Battle of Te Ranga, British troops caught Puhirake's warriors while they were still digging a new, unfinished pā. This time the bayonet charge was devastating: more than 80 Māori were killed or mortally wounded, including Rawiri Puhirake himself. Te Ranga was the tragic flip side of Gate Pā, and it broke the resistance in the region. Peace was signed in August 1864, but at a brutal cost to Māori: the Crown confiscated (raupatu) some 290,000 acres of land, which was surveyed and handed out to military settlers. The European town of Tauranga was literally founded on that confiscated land.
Founded on confiscated land, European Tauranga grew slowly through the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a small port and rural centre. The big boom came in the 20th century, driven by two engines. The first was farming. With its sunshine and volcanic soils, the Bay of Plenty became the heart of New Zealand horticulture, and above all the world capital of kiwifruit, grown in huge quantities across the region and exported all over the planet. The second was the port. Port of Tauranga grew into New Zealand's largest export port, the gateway for the country's timber, kiwifruit and cargo.
That economic growth drew thousands of people, and Tauranga became one of the fastest-growing cities in the country. But what really shaped its identity was the beach. Mount Maunganui had been a separate town until the harbour bridge linked it to Tauranga in 1988, and it became the North Island's summer holiday destination of choice. Families from all over the country came (and still come) every summer to the beach at the foot of Mauao, and 'the Mount' became shorthand for sun, surf and holidays.
Today Tauranga and the Mount live this double life: a thriving, growing port city, and at the same time the laid-back beach mecca of the North Island, home to what many consider the best beach in the country. And more and more, the region is recognising and honouring the history that came before. Māori names, starting with Mauao, are back in the spotlight. The battles of Gate Pā and Te Ranga are commemorated with respect on both sides. And the Ngāi Te Rangi, Ngāti Ranginui and Ngāti Pūkenga iwi are taking a leading role again in caring for their land and their ancestral mountain. Behind the postcard of golden sand and a volcanic cone lies a deep story: the mountain caught by the light of the morning, the canoes that rested in the harbour, and a people who lost their land and are now reclaiming their place.
