The Tane Moana Sea Man tree is cool. It is a 40 minute unremarkable hike from this trailhead. Half of the hike is in a dry pine tree forest that is not very pretty. Near the start, you cross over a couple of fences with stairs. The field between the two fences feels like you are trespassing.
Great local walk. Pretty easy take the kids. About 40mins to tane moana. You can do a longer walk to matapouri that's 2 hours one way. Doesn't have very good parking, it's down a gravel road and this a little bit of room to park on the side of the road.
Such an impressive Kauri tree. To get there you drive down Waiotoi Road, Ngunguru. Note: Google maps first took us to a incorrect route near matapouri which led to a private road with keycode gate. On Waiotoi Road there's about three car parks right opposite the start of the track. There is a small sign on right side of main road that is easy to miss. It says track closed but the track to the tree is still open. At the start of the track you climb over a fence and walk on private land then there is small track through pine trees that leads to a wider vehicle track all the way to the tree. Dont go off the main track. There is one more big sign that says 30 mins to tree but actually its only 5-10 mins.
Very easy walk. Tracks are pretty clearly marked by orange markers. We started from a dirt road area that went up hill under tree cover. Within about 300 metres you make your way through an open paddock up hill for about 300 metres. The rest of the track is though a wide access road within a forestry block until the last few hundred metres where Tane Moana lies. Great reward once you get to Tane Moana. Make sure your scrub your boots with brush provided at entrance to Tane Moana.
There is a warning sign see photo where the track starts, but it's not closed. It's approximately 1.7km took us about 45 mins with a 4yo to get to the sign post of the Tane Moana track. You just need to keep following the orange track markers from the start.nOnce you get to the sign post, it's ~700m walk 12mins with our 4yo uphill till you get to the tree, definitely lot less than the 30mins that the sign post suggest!
