Tinui takes centre stage
As you approach the tiny hamlet of Tinui, a pleasant 35-minute drive east of Masterton, to your right you'll see a brooding, vertical rock face surrounded by dense, mixed vegetation. This view of Mount Maunsell, or Tinui Taipo gives a striking indication of what's in store for those intending to do the relatively short hike along the Tinui Anzac Walkway.
By Simon Burt. Photos by Pete Monk.
“Before you start, this track is NOT an 'easy stroll'.” The stern warning stapled to the walkway’s carpark noticeboard seems at odds with the friendly-looking entrance. The 3.1 km track climbs over 300 vertical metres to the trig point, but for most walkers the goal is the adjacent Anzac Cross, visible on the taipo – meaning devil in Te Reo Maori – from the village and surrounding farmland.
The original wooden cross, believed to be New Zealand’s first Anzac memorial, was erected on April 25, 1916 – the first official Anzac Day – after a service conducted by Rev. Basil Ashcroft to commemorate Anzac soldiers recently fallen at Gallipoli. By 1965 the cross had succumbed to the elements, and a durable aluminium replacement was tethered to the same spot. In recent years the cross has become the symbol of Tinui, and its LED-lit outline glows moon-like at night.
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In 2014, the Tinui Parish Anzac Trust opened the walkway to provide public access to the cross. Alan Emerson, chair of the Trust, says that many generous locals contributed to the walkway’s development, and the Army helped greatly with cutting the track and building shelters and toilets. The wider Wairarapa business community donated legal and surveying services as well as labour and materials.
Since Rev. Ashcroft’s first service over a century ago, Anzac Day ceremonies have continued to be held in Tinui every year. Until recently, they drew around 50 or 60 attendees, but these days crowds of over 1,000 turn up in the village to pay their respects at the War Memorial Hall. “It’s the big deal out here,” says local historian Caryl Forrest, proprietor of the online Tinui Times. Caryl traces the event’s popularity back to 2009, when the government and the Air Force started to actively promote Tinui as a safer alternative to Turkey for those wanting to make Anzac pilgrimages. A slogan was even devised: “If you can't get to Gallipoli, come to Tinui.”
The event is a major logistical exercise for the little village, whose population is somewhere between sixteen and twenty five, depending on who you ask. For the preceding fortnight there's a big community tidy-up, and three days before the service fifty or so volunteers begin to work in earnest to prepare for the crowds. The hall is decorated with photos and Anzac memorabilia, and its kitchens are scrubbed. On the day, seating for 500 is put out around the Hall's cenotaph in time for the arrival of a veterans parade at 10:30 a.m. The Anzac service is then conducted by village vicar Steve Thomson. Weather permitting, there might be an Airforce flyover.
Local attendees bring plates, and after the service a slap-up morning tea is enjoyed by everyone. Then a large part of the crowd walk to the memorial cross at the top of Tinui Taipo, and many more are ferried up on four-wheel-drives by local farmers.
One of these farmers is Rahui Station's Bill Maunsell, a descendant of Archdeacon Robert Maunsell, who bought neighbouring Tinui Station in 1859. Bill has been heavily involved with the Anzac Trust and the development of the walkway, and he laments the wilding pines that have invaded parts of the track. “They're a major pest,” he says. “We'd like to maintain the look of the rock and the bush around the cross, and also keep it open so it can be seen. It's an ongoing issue.”
Bill also regrets the current state of the rural scene. “Farming is becoming marginal,” he says. “Farmers aren't employing, shearing is hardly worth it, the new fencing requirements will finish us off. We seem to be bearing the brunt of the rural-urban divide.”
Bill’s farm, Rahui, is the 1,600 acre back block of the original 20,000 acre Tinui Station. His daughter Lucinda moved back five years ago and lives in one of the cottages with her young daughter, Lilah. Positively buzzing with energy, Lucinda has given Tinui a bit of a shakeup and seems to be involved in everything in the village. Two years ago she started an e-bike tour business, Rahui Coastal Loop, which features a 65km round-trip over local roads and native bush. The three-day Loop de Loop tour includes a night on the coast and one at The Sow's Ear, another of Rahui's cottages, which has been lovingly restored by Lucinda and Bill.
There hasn't historically been a lot of tourism in Tinui, but the village is a convenient leg-stretching point on the increasingly popular drive from Masterton to Castlepoint Beach. When you arrive, you'll immediately stumble upon the Tinui Café & Bar, which replaced the original Tinui Hotel in 2008. Bill Maunsell remembers when the old building was moved to Greytown. “It caused a local uproar,” he says. “It did need a lot of work. We lost the accommodation, but we got a new pub.” Proprietors Cindy and Stu Sowry are upbeat about their business and notice more overseas visitors calling in. It's also a popular hub for the community – Lucinda Maunsell recalls meeting the Plunket nurse there to weigh her baby.
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A left turn at the pub leads to the village proper and the Craft Corner, where the shelves of what was once the general store are stocked with knitwear, sheepskin items and local arts and crafts. At the rear of the shop a quirky museum displays items of interest from the district. The Corner is run by a roster of a dozen or so volunteers, and current co-ordinator Jean Greer says that every year the visitors book gets a bit fuller and, like the pub's, more international. A closed-down tearoom next door is due to re-open any day.
Behind the corner a leafy picnic spot is tucked in amongst historic police station, jail and school buildings. Nearby, a stone lychgate is conspicuously missing its church. The Church of the Good Shepherd and its dozen or so parishioners were controversially relocated to a site beside the Memorial Hall in 2019. “There was certainly some debate,” Bill Maunsell says, “but it was on a flood plain so it had to be either moved or elevated. Whichever way it went, I don't think the congregation was going to increase.”
On the other side of the Hall, Tinui School is a hive of activity. Principal Richard Lennox says the roll is steady at around forty, and junior class numbers suggest a bright future. The children are always involved in the Anzac Day service, and in late 2018 the entire school walked up to the cross for an overnight camp.
The Walkway is definitely not an easy stroll, but this not-particularly-fit superannuitant managed to drag his creaky hips up and down on a 30°C late summer's day. On the descent I passed a spritely young couple from Florida heading for the top – they just about caught me up back at the carpark. I recalled that Bill Maunsell had offered me a ride, but I was keen to follow so many who have climbed to the Anzac Cross, contemplated the past, and looked out over the little village far below.
