By Rhonda Bartle

People have always been fascinated by Paritutu. Long before the region became inhabited by Pakeha, the rock had been a Te Atiawa stronghold.  Brave volunteers were often lowered down her steep face on flax ropes to collect water from a spring on her side while under siege from marauding Waikato tribes.

The first white man to climb her was probably Dicky Barrett around 1828, and in 1840, Frederick Alonzo Carrington climbed up to peruse the site he'd chosen for New Plymouth.

In 1893, alpinist Malcolm Ross completed the climb alone saying it was one of the most difficult he'd done. Paritutu saw the first fatality that same year, when William Watt, 22, plunged to his death on the rocks below.

The last death occurred in January 2005, when New Plymouth man Robert Quince, 32, went missing. He is presumed to have fallen and drowned.

During the 1960s to 1970s, seamen would often race each other from the port to the summit and back and a record of 16 minutes was set.  This was later broken by a local man who shaved 3 minutes off the time.

Constable Ray Petrowski, stationed at Moturoa, was often called out to bring amateur climbers down from seaward side.

A track that came from a book

In 1887, when  Archibald Hood took it upon himself to raise enough money to carve out a rough track to the top, he did it by retelling an old tale of tragedy and love. His booklet Oronoa: a story of Paritutu raised enough money to make the track, as well as string a barbed wired fence around the base to keep cattle off. 

The track remains today, and a wire rope to help climbers on their way replaces a copper cable, salvaged long ago from overhead trolley bus wires, that disappeared the first night it went up.

In 1992, a new trig station was helicoptered in to replace the old rusted one that had staunchly weathered the sea spray for 22 years.

Oronoa: a story of Paritutu retold in 2005

Tipi was a pretty thing, as slender as a young totara.  Just sixteen, she was already married to Mohoio, the third son of the great Te Atiawa chief, Hohara.  Promised to Mohoio since babyhood, the match was a good one, and the couple were fiercely in love.  Tipi wore a greenstone tiki around her neck that had been passed down through many generations.

Already, in her life, Tipi had known much sadness and pain.  Her father, chief of a neighbouring hapu, had been crushed to death by a falling tree the night before her marriage. Her mother, choosing not to live without him, willed herself to die after thrusting her newborn baby into Tipi's arms with the words 'Child, look after my child.'

Mohoio was tall and straight, with a finely tattooed face.  When his father and elder brothers fell in battle at Moturoa, it was up to him to pull the cloak of leadership on.

It was the height of summer, during Mohoio's first year of reign, when the  men launched their waka off Ngamotu beach and headed out on their last fishing foray of the season. 

No sooner had the canoes disappeared over the horizon, when a war party of Waikato warriors passed close to where the women and children were collecting herbs and berries.  Running for their canoes, they paddled swiftly through the waves, waiting safely on the water until their men returned.

Tipi had left her baby sister in the care of an old kuia at Otaka Pa before she headed off to Kaweroa reef to fetch mussels.  Now, she held her hands over her eyes and stared out to sea.  There was her kuia, bobbing on the water. She hoped the baby was with her.

Thinking the baby was safe, she and a few last stragglers ran for the remaining canoes and paddled out to the others. But when Tipi reached the kuia, she learned that the baby had been left behind asleep in the pa.

Tipi made a plan to go and get her baby sister.  At midnight she slipped into the cold sea and swam until her feet touched the iron sand.

Carefully, she crept up the track to Otaka pa, past the line of sleeping Waikato warriors.  Inside, she found the baby next to a Waikato chief who had claimed her for his own. Silently Tipi  scooped her up and crept out of the pa.

Back down to the sea she went, but as she put the child down to wrap her in a mat so she could carry her on her back, the baby awoke with a startled cry.

Immediately, the chief appeared at the palisades, rubbing sleep from his eyes, but still awake enough to raise the alarm.

Tipi ran as fast as she could with her enemies behind her.  She knew she would never outrun them, and she looked to the sky for help.  There before her stood Paritutu and she knew her way to the top.  'I can out-climb them,' she thought.

It was hard going through the flax with the baby, but she knew once she reached the summit she would be safe.  As she began her ascent, the panting of the warriors behind her echoed through the  night.  Part way up the rock, she found a foothold and began to tear at the rocks with her fingers,  flinging them downwards into the darkness, revelling in the cries of pain that followed them.

Every few minutes she stopped and dug and threw the rocks down.  And on such a narrow pathway, her missiles didn't miss.  Soon, the Waikato gave up their chase and returned to Otaka pa.

Stopping every few steps to rearrange her precious bundle, Tipi finally reached the top.  When she sat down to catch her breath she saw the dawn had streaked the sky with purple and pink. Far below, there was no sign of the fishermen coming over the horizon, but she was cerain they'd return that day.  With the baby in her arms, she sat down to wait.

It was a long day and so was the next, and the baby grew hungry and wailed in distress. Down on the beach, Tipi could see the Waikato watching out for her men.

When the fishermen finally appeared in the bay, they learned that  Tipi had gone back for the baby and not returned. 

Mohoio was distraught.  He wanted to roar along the beach and take on every warrior himself.  But logic and intelligence took over. 

He too made a plan. Knowing the Waikato would follow them along the beach, he ordered every waka to be rowed to Kaweroa.  The dash would wear his enemies out, and put them at a disadvantage for the battle that had to come.

They followed, as he'd known they would, and when he and his warriors met them on the sand, his were fresher and better prepared. 

But despite his clever strategy, Mohoio was badly injured when a taiaha blow tore out an eye.  He set out to find Tipi after learning  from a captured prisoner that she had sought safety on Paritutu.

Up the steep path  he hurried, hoping against hope to find Tipi safe at the top.  He took to the stony path not minding where he put his feet.  And when he reached the top, his heart filled with love and instant relief. There she was, sleeping soundly in a hollow, the greenstone at her neck and the baby safe in her arms.   'Tipi!  Tipi!' he called.

 But happiness turned to horror when Mohoio reached his wife and found her stiff and cold. In an attempt to nourish the hungry child,  Tipi had opened a vein in her arm  and quietly bled to death. 

Mohoio was distraught, but there was nothing he could do, except name the baby Oronoa which means 'Saved with difficulty.'