Warea

Home / Why Taranaki Area / Warea

The ocean swells of ‘Stent Road’ are one of New Zealand’s classic surf breaks and every time a new Stent Road sign went up it quickly disappeared by trophy hunting surfers. Some say it was the local surfers trying to hide their world class surf break. Now days since the sign has been made more solid so it stays put.

Warea is a community in the west of Taranaki, in the North Island of New Zealand. It is located on State Highway 45, 26 kilometres north of Ōpunake. The local Pūniho Marare, also known as Tarawainuku Marae, is a traditional meeting ground of the Taranaki Iwi hapū of Ngā Māhanga. It includes the Kaimirumiru and Ko Pauna te Tipuna meeting houses.

History: Warea is a small settlement 35 km south-west of New Plymouth, where the German missionary Johann Riemenschneider established a mission station in 1846. Two of his students, Te Whiti-o-Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi, both later attained fame as the leaders of Parihaka’s passive resistance movement against land sales.

There were a number of military engagements in the area during the 1860s, and the 43rd Regiment built a redoubt on the coast near the end of Stent Road in 1865