Arapawa Island to Port Underwood
Whaling across Cook Strait
Nigel Prickett’s archaeological study places Port Underwood and Tory Channel among the major centres of New Zealand shore whaling, alongside Kāpiti, Kaikōura, Banks Peninsula, Otago and Foveaux Strait. The connections are geographical and industrial: vessels, crews and whale products moved through the Cook Strait region. This entry describes the wider whaling landscape, rather than asserting a particular documented voyage from Arapawa Island to Port Underwood.
The growth of Port Underwood stations
Prickett records that Port Underwood was known to whalers as Cloudy Bay. Shore whaling began there around 1830, with one or two parties from Sydney, including an operation associated with John Guard at Kākāpō Bay. The fishery was especially active in 1834–35. In 1836, Prickett reports six shore stations and as many as eighteen whaling vessels competing for whales in the area. He cites an account of 70 or 80 boats pursuing a single whale; that is a historical report, not an independently verified boat count.
Decline and historical evidence
Prickett reports that the catch attributed to shore parties and American vessels had fallen to about 300 tuns in 1838. A contemporary explanation was that ships hunting farther offshore intercepted whales before they entered the bay. The report documents station locations and surviving archaeological traces, including Kākāpō Bay, Cutters Bay and Robertson Point. Those physical remains are a separate kind of evidence from the nineteenth-century written estimates.
Source
Nigel Prickett, The Archaeology of New Zealand Shore Whaling (2002), introductory history and chapter 7, “Port Underwood”, especially pp. 64 onward. The published report cites McNab (1913), McIntosh (1940) and other earlier authorities for historical estimates.
Across Cook Strait: a shared whaling geography
Kāpiti was part of a wider Cook Strait economy, not a self-contained island fishery. Te Ara identifies Tory Channel and Port Underwood as major centres of early shore whaling, with sheltered waters and seasonal right-whale movements attracting stations. John Guard moved to Port Underwood in 1829; by 1836 Te Ara records six shore stations and 18 whaling ships at anchor in that area.
The comparison matters because the same trade networks connected boats, headsmen, provisions, Sydney merchants and coastal settlements on both sides of the strait. A ship recorded in one harbour could be connected commercially to other stations, but its appearance in a regional account is not proof of a specific Kāpiti landing. Voyage-by-voyage claims require logs or port records.
Shore stations tended to favour places with good landings, fresh water, timber and access to food. This helps explain why whaling traces cluster in particular bays and islands rather than appearing evenly along the coast.