How to forest bathe the Maori way
Lessons from soaking in the sacred Waipoua Forest in New Zealand
I’m usually pretty easygoing when it comes to traveling around. I’m not one of those people with a list of must-sees and most-dos. I’m more of a “let’s see what’s in flow” experiential traveler who often stays in the same town for a few weeks on end. This is all to say it was pretty uncharacteristic for me to demand that we go to a specific forest to see a specific tree during a recent trip to New Zealand.
I was with my boyfriend Sam and his family in Wellington, on the southern left corner of the North Island. Our plan was to leave the family and take a few day road trip, stopping for soaks in hot springs and hikes on cool tracks. My boyfriend even tried to ignore my plead to go to the Waipoua Forest, on the upper right corner of the North Island, at first because it was just too far of a drive. But then my mom just happened to send me an article about the forest the day we were planning our trip and I knew that the subtle message I was getting had now gotten louder. We both know enough to trust our intuition so we went for it. Booked tickets to fly to Auckland and a rental car to drive up to the forest. I booked a twilight tour with Footprints Waipoua, which has been called one of the 82 “experiences of a lifetime” by Lonely Planet (Curious about the other ones?).
And so we were off. Something happened along the drive up that shifted us out of the regular day to day and into a more aware-of-everything journey space. It may have happened the moment we walked into a tavern in Dargaville for dinner. The place is what happens when a Kiwi (Al) who worked on an oil rig meets a baby blue scrunchie-wearing woman from Houston (Donna) and they fall in love and decide to make their pub-tavern-hotel in the country somewhere dream a reality and then travel back in time to about 1986 to do so.
I ordered a glass of wine (they proudly only carry wines from New Zealand) and we started to tell them what brought us to this rural town in the middle of their winter. We were the only people in the whole place and it almost seemed like they were surprised we came in…or perhaps like they’d been waiting for us and wondering what had taken so long.
“We’re on somewhat of a pilgrimage to the Waipoua forest,” we tell them as we inspect the menu of fried things, burgers and pies.
Al’s not surprised. He confirms the forest is spiritual to the Maori and there’s also carvings that seem to show that Celtic people were there way before, around 3,000 years ago. This evidence is being hushed because of the politics around it. He promises he’s not a conspiracy theorist but that he has the right to know the real history. He says there are still little people in the forest and big people who did all the carvings.
The Aratapu Tavern is the kind of place you want to take photos of just to prove it existed. There’s Texas license plates and crocheted table cloths. I order a fish fillet with coleslaw and kumara — the local sweet potatoes. We opt out of the good ol’ American pie and continue on our way.
It was a clear dark night and at one point we pulled over to look at the stars but I got so creeped out I ran back into the car. It was that heightened sense of aliveness at night. It felt as if there were spirits gliding by us.
We drove another hour through the Waipoua forest before arriving at a lodge that we’d booked on AirBnB.
“You have to see the Southern Cross,” Candy said as she was showing us around the lodge. She had printed out a weekly star guide and handed it to us. Of course the woman who owned the lodge was a white haired wild woman spirit guide. She showed us around, showed us how to work the fireplace heater, and told us about some day trips around the area. She warned us about low tides.
We tried to get her story — she grew up in San Diego and moved here with her late husband in the 70s. They raised children and grandchildren here, she’s been with a younger Maori guy for 12 years now. She gave me her card — she has an MBA and a PhD. She’s a scientist, an editor (even worked on a paper from Kyoto University about forest bathing), and a teacher.
She also went ahead and told us about the history that’s not in the books — about the people before the Maori who were here, in the forest. “The little people, the big people, the red haired people, the blonde haired people,” she said. Her Maori lover’s whanaunga (extended family) goes back to the original Polynesian settlers and even they give no pretense that they were the first ones here. I’m not sure why this information kept getting proffered to us — it felt like gossip that wasn’t mine. I was just on a journey to see about some famous trees.
We had a day to explore the rural Northland region before meeting the group at 4:30pm for our twilight tour so we found a cafe for breakfast (pro-tip: the best smoked salmon I’ve ever had), walked on a track around the ocean, drove around, and took refuge at a coffee shop when it started to rain.
Finally, we decided to go to the puzzle shop. It was one of the area’s top attractions and seemed like a good activity for a rainy afternoon. A really big man with a white beard greeted us and immediately handed us each a puzzle. Louis came to New Zealand in the 1970s. He made it as far as this forest and then never left.
His shop was filled to the brim with puzzles — ones that he’s designed and collected from around the world. I gave up after a few minutes. Puzzles have never really been my thing. And plus, I wanted to go check out the maze that he had made next to the shop.
In my head it was a meditation labyrinth, but no—this was a life-sized puzzle. We had to go around collecting all 15 letters that were hidden around the maze, which is easy enough until you get turned around and then lose track of which letters you’ve found. The 15 letters spelled out two words. The first was 5 letters and the second 10. Can you figure out?
E R I A C G E E Y H W E R M V
We finally did when he told us that he’s already used the phrase a few times and the second word was two five letter words combined.
MAGIC EVERYWHERE
And the it was time for the tour.
It was raining hard when we got out the of the van. I was bummed at first, but then learned that Waipoua is composed of three characters that mean night rain forest so actually we were seeing the forest in its namesake condition.
The first thing Kevin our guide did was say a kia ora, a greeting and a prayer in Maori, welcoming the six of us travelers to the forest and wishing us well on our journey. Kevin was born near this forest but grew up mostly in the South Island.
The Department of Conservation had set up shoe washing stations and we were to wash our sneakers upon entering and exiting the forest. It was an intricate three part station that felt like a carwash for your feet. First you stepped on a soapy cushion, then you brushed them, and then you stood over a vent to dry them. I loved this immersive experience and even though the purpose is mitigate Kauri dieback, a deadly fungus-like disease that spreads through the roots and has killed thousands of kauri trees in New Zealand in the past 10 years, there was something about the cleansing ritual that added to the sacredness of the journey to the forest.
We were told there would be 10 stops during our walk to the largest kauri tree Te Matua Ngahere (the “father of the forest”) and the tallest kauri tree Tane Mahuta (the “lord of the forest”). At each stop the guide shared stories and information about the forest. He pointed out flax and manuka, showed us medicinal plants and then gave us a natural medicinal salve made from the plant. He shared a lot about the Kauri trees — the male and female conifers, how they self-prune as they grow, and the kauri gum, a resin that leaks out from cracks in the bark, that was once worth more than gold.
My favorite part were the Maori stories he shared about the forest. They go a little something like this:
Why the kauri tree has scales:
The Maori consider the kauri tree and the whale the chiefs of their environments — the giant of the land the giant of the sea. The whale invited the kauri to come into the ocean but the tree said, “I don’t have any scales!” And so the whale suggested that they exchange skins.
Right when the kauri was about to jump in, it looked back at its family and decided that he didn’t want to leave them. The kauri decided to stay on land and that’s why it has scales and the whale has none.
The lesson from Rātā the Warrior:
One day, Rātā the warrior went into the forest, cut down a tree, and began to carve it into a waka (canoe). When he returned the next day to continue his task, the tree was miraculously standing up again. Rātā felled it again and set to work, but the same thing happened the following day, and the next. Finally, Rātā hid behind a bush and saw the hakuturi (forest guardians in the form of birds, insects and other life) replanting the tree. When he confronted them, they told him he had failed to perform the appropriate rites—he hadn’t asked for permission before cutting down the tree. When he did, the forest guardians released the tree.
This story reminds us to respect the forest and ask before disturbing it in any way.
How the kiwi lost its wings:
One day, Tane Mahuta was walking through the forest. He looked up at his children reaching for the sky and he noticed that they were starting to sicken, as bugs were eating them.
He asked different birds to come down to clean the forest floor, but each one had an excuse. They didn’t want to give up their nests, bright colors, or wings.
Finally, the kiwi bird said he would do the job. The Kiwi decided to take one for the team, because if no one did then they would all lose their homes.
And so, the kiwi said a final goodbye to the sun filtering through the trees and came down to the forest floor. For the sacrifice he made, Tane Mahuta said that he would become the most well-known and most-loved bird of them all. (Read the full story here!)
What’s so important about these so-called “bedtime stories” is the wisdom held within them. They spark a memory and remind us of the original truth.
And then as we approached Te Matua Ngahere the guide started to sing an incantation. It was so powerful that it brought tears to my eyes.
The giant tree is around 3,5oo years old and has a girth of 16 meters and actually has an entire jungle living on it. There are 45 different species including another kauri tree growing on top of it. It was just like the tree from Avatar (which was, of course, filmed in New Zealand).
We shared a moment of peace. And then shared a tea made from a local medicinal plant. All of our senses were activated and we were thoroughly dropped into the experience. Still, we had yet to visit the most famous tree in New Zealand.
We performed the same ritual while walking up to Tane Mahuta. This tree is impossibly tall —51.2 meters. And when you see it at night it felt even more dramatic because you had to shine your flashlight up and down to see it.
This tree is also a physical representation of the Maori creation story:
“In the beginning before the world was light, Rangi the sky-father and Papa the earth-mother were bound together, their offspring caught in the darkness between them. Their strongest son, Tane Mahuta, put his shoulder to Papa and thrust upwards with his powerful legs, creating life and light.”
I was wondering if I would get a strong message from these trees because they had called to me and I came all the way to see them. What could they have to say? I didn’t get a strong message, I just felt a knowing in my heart that I was in the exact right spot. A confirmation.
On the way out, I started to ask Kevin some questions. I told him about forest bathing and he lit up. “I do feel so much better when I’ve been in the woods!” he reflected.
He said that there are some people who come to visit these trees on sacred journeys regularly. Once his papa, his grandfather, got lost in the woods for 18 days while he was in his 40s. They sent a search and rescue crew to look for him. He walked out of the forest healthier than ever and said that the little people helped him.
Stories about little people and archaeologic evidence of other people living in this forest abound in the area and on the corners of the internet. It doesn’t feel like my story to tell, but maybe that is why the forest called to me. There are so many stories, so much mystery, living in this place.
And, as Kevin told us at the end of the walk — 98% of the native forests are gone. He thanked us for our contribution to the forest— not just the money, but the energy we brought with us. Paying respect to these wise giants is the least we could do.
We stopped in town on our way back to the lodge after the tour. It was 8:30pm and everything was closed. Sam managed to grab the last curry chicken pie available in town and then we drove home.
“So do you think it was worth it?” I asked, referring to our long journey up to the forest.
But before he could answer he slammed on the brakes. There was a kiwi bird in the middle of the road. We got out of the car to say hi as the flightless bird waddled into the woods. It was some kind of metaphorical answer to my question.
