For the students of the Little Valley 21st Century Learning Center.

The Legend of Paikea...

Paikea came to New Zealand from the Pacific Islands on the back of a whale many many centuries ago. Today the Kati Kuri people of Kaikoura (an area world famous for whale watching) are among his descendants.

Paikea was the youngset and the favoured son of Chief Uenuku and he came from Mangaia in the Cook Islands. His fathers favouritism made his older brothers very jealous and so they joined together in a conspiracy to kill Paikea. They would kill him while they were fishing offshore and tell their father that he had drowned.

The night before the deed was to be done, Paikea pretended to be asleep and listened whilst his brothers plotted to kill him.

When they were far out at sea he foiled their plan by deliberately sinking the canoe and drowning his brothers.

Adrift in the ocean he clung to a plank of wood waiting for his own death.

However Tohora the whale had other ideas and he lifted Paikea on to his back and took him south to New Zealand and the settlement of Whangara north of Gisborne where he began a new and prosperous life.

Many years later one of his son's Tahupotiki travelled further south and became the founder of the South Island tribe the Ngai Tahu. It is from both Tahupotiki and Paikea that the Ngai Tahu and Kati Kuri of Kaikoura claim their descent.

Legends for TODAY...

Whale Watch is a multi award winning nature tourism company that is both owned and operated by the Kati Kuri people of Kaikoura (a Maori sub-tribe of the South Island's larger Ngai Tahu tribe).

Whale Watch came about in 1987 at a time when the Maori were the main casualties of the declining economy in Kaikoura. Bill Solomon, a local leader, felt that the sperm whales offered the answer to the unemployment problems of indigenous people.

Knowing that their ancestor Paikea had journeyed to a new life in New Zealand on the back of Tohora it was appropriate for his descendants to again ride on the back of a whale to a new life.

The founders of Whale Watch mortgaged their homes to start a business that was run with a small inflatable boat. In time this was replaced by a larger boat with an upper viewing deck and today the company have four catamarans specially designed for whale watching.

The expansion of Whale Watch meant the building of an entire marina in South Bay and the turning of Kaikoura into one of New Zealand's premier tourist attractions offering a range of marine wildlife activities. This has all meant a boom with accommodation, restaurants, cafes, galleries etc being built and operated.

Paikea and Tohora remain the symbolic heads of Whale Watch and offer a spiritual bond between the human and the natural world...a world where nature is revered and not exploited.