Tomahawk Beach is a beautiful white-sand surf beach, the first on the Otago Peninsula, on the edge of Dunedin. It is separated from better-known St Kilda by Lawyers Head, which provides an element of relative remoteness.
You can drive to the top of Lawyers Head on John Wilson Ocean Drive for a view of Tomahawk, and walk from there along the cliff at the edge of the golf course to the beach. The beach is about 1.5 km long and you can wander along the beach to the east to equally pretty Smaills Beach at low tide. Keep an eye out for sea lions on the beach.
The beach's name, apparently, has nothing to do with throwing axes and tomahawks. A likely explanation is that it’s a transliteration from the 1850s for the Māori phrase “toma haka”, meaning more or less “to dance beside the gravesite”. But this is only one possible explanation.
To reach Tomahawk Beach from central Dunedin, drive to Anderson Bay, then take Tomahawk Road for 1.6 km to the beach car park. The car park is just before the small town of Ocean Grove. From the car park, it’s either a short walk through the dunes or around the stream, fed by Tomahawk Lagoon. Continuing on Tomahawk Road also connects you to Centre Road, which takes you to spectacular Highcliff Road on the Otago Peninsula ridgeline.
