One of many great drives on Aotea Great Barrier Island is to Whangapoua Bay. Continue on Aotea Road to Okiwi, turn right onto (unsealed) Maybey Road and follow it to Whangapoua Bay. This gets you close to the north end of the beach.
The beach itself is mostly a white-sand, east-coast surf beach. The two vaguely Pacific island shelters are a feature. If you walk north to the rocky point, you will find the very pretty historic gravesites of some of the victims of one of New Zealand’s worst maritime disasters – the sinking of the SS Wairarapa in the late 1800s.
You can also camp at the Whangapoua Campsite, albeit this is some distance from the south end of the beach.
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