Waiwakaiho Road

Waiwakaiho Road is divided into two parts, separated by the river that it is named after. One section runs south-east from Egmont Road in Hillsborough, while the other connects SH3 with the popular picnic spot, Meeting of the Waters. The river and almost all uses of the word now spell it with an extra ‘h’ after the second ‘w’, a more phonetically correct spelling.

While the road retains the spelling commonly used until more recently, for many years it was known by a much more colloquial name, the “Mutton Track”.

This unusual nickname came about after an incident in February 1864, described in some detail by the Taranaki Herald. Alerted to sightings of ‘rebel natives’ on “Rossiters Farm” near the Waiwhakaiho River, two parties of Bushrangers set off to explore the local area.

At the camp they discovered eight large Māori ovens, a barrowload or more of mutton in front of each and “kidneys civilly put aside uncooked”. These were taken back to town and “found to be excellent”. Potatoes, dried kumara and a small kit of “Mr Rossiter’s excellent apples by way of dessert” completed the meal left behind.

The skins of twenty sheep were found nearby in Allen’s clearing, the brands identifying them as belonging to local farmers Batten, Smith, Rossiter and Joll. The event quickly entered local folklore and little more than two months later the newspaper referred to the area as the ‘Mutton Line’ and then by late 1864 as the ‘Mutton Track’, a name which would stick.

The Waiwakaiho Road Board was kept busy with requests from residents of the “Mutton Track” to metal the road, with three residents asking in 1912, “to put the Mutton Track in order”. The board agreed to the request after the residents agreed to pay £25 toward the cost, provide a crusher site for two years and provide the metal “free of royalty”.

The Waiwhakaiho Quarry, located at the end of the Hillsborough side of the road and run by Whitaker Civil Engineering, provides an interesting link to the past.   

This story was originally published in the Taranaki Daily News.

Related documents and plans:

William Richards and the Mutton Track (Taranaki Herald 7 December 1864)

Bushrangers And Mutton Track (Taranaki Herald 18 March 1865)

Taranaki DP282 Sheet 1 (1886), ICS Pre 300,000 Cadastral Plan Index (Imaged by LINZ)

Taranaki SO884 Sheet 1 (1898), ICS Pre 300,000 Cadastral Plan Index (Imaged by LINZ) 

Taranaki SO2980 Sheet 1 (1907), ICS Pre 300,000 Cadastral Plan Index (Imaged by LINZ)