Pahi, New Zealand


Pahi is a settlement in Northland, New Zealand. It is at the end of a peninsula in the Kaipara Harbour, bounded by inlets to the Paparoa Creek to the west and the Pahi River to the east. Paparoa is 6 km to the north, and Matakohe is 4 km to the north-west.
Pahi was one of several Kaipara settlements established by a religious group known as Albertlanders. Port Albert near Wellsford was the main settlement, and Matakohe was another. After the Paparoa Block was settled in 1863, a road was constructed to the port at Pahi in 1865.
The steamer Minnie Casey ran a weekly service from Pahi to Helensville on the south side of the Kaipara from 1882, and the S.S. Ethel took over from 1891–95, after which services went only to Matakohe and Pahi.
Pahi is best known for its annual regatta; the Pahi Regatta Club was established in 1887, and a regatta has been held every year except 1925. Taking place over three days, events included sailing and later motorboat races, children's sports, foot races, aquatic events, rowing, and horse-swimming races across the strait to Whakapirau and back. Horse-swimming races ceased after a horse and rider drowned.
The Pahi Reserve and Campground contains a Moreton Bay fig tree with a girth of over, one of the largest specimens of this species in the world, and considered "one of the ten finest exotic in New Zealand."

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