YACHTSMEN ENJOY BIG “KAPA MAORI”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 226, 13 December 1927, Page 14

YACHTSMEN ENJOY BIG “KAPA MAORI”

Homai te pooka , kapai te poaka, e te rewai, e te kumera , e te pipi. Kapai te waipirau. Which, being - translated with a good deal of liberty: Give me some pork, very good the pork, the potatoes the kumera, and the pipis. Very good the cup of tea. Last Saturday evening several boatloads of yachtsmen had the time of their lives. Fifty or 60 of them visited Mahurangi, on the Warkworth River, in flotilla of big keelers consisting of Waitangi, Prize, Rawene, Ida, Little Jim, lorangi and Rangi. It had previously been decided to have a “Kapa Maori” or a great feast of victuals cooked in Maori style. A big pig had been sent down in advance to Mahurangi, where hospitable Maoris living there cooked it, as only Maoris know how. The Waitemata men followed the pig on Saturday afternoon, arriving in their big white canoes about 5.30 p.m., famished and ready for an evening’s enjoyment. Nor were they disappointed. A most wonderful “tangi” was held and everybody had a great fe&st of steaming pork and pipis> potatoes and kumera cooked on hot stones in correct native fashion. There was much singing and merriment on the beach, and as the evening grew late the banqueters returned to their ships for the night, or slept ashore at Sullivan’s house. There was one drawback to the place, and that was the impossibility of anchoring close in to the beach. Accordingly, the yachts lay off at Lushington’s, the crews going ashore after a good paddle in dinghies.