The Katikati Heritage Museum tells the story of Katikati from its earliest Maori settlers to the establishment of the world’s only planted Ulster Irish settlement, to more recent times through artefacts, displays, photographs and documents.

Our museum offers a fun, educational and affordable journey through the past, and displays a wealth of household items, furnishings and farm tools that were in common use in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Walk-through scenes and exhibits include a recreated Victorian sailing ship cabin, where you can imagine just what it must have been like for the Irish immigrant families who spent three months crossing the world in such a confined space.

Our exhibits help illustrate the lives of the pioneer loggers and bush workers, the farmers breaking in their land, the early orchardists and the hard-working men and women who settled the western Bay of Plenty.

Ours is a small and friendly museum: visitors are welcome to snap flash photos, leaf through the old records and even handle artefacts without receiving the evil eye from attendants. You can’t get closer to history than that!

Our museum is a journey down memory lane for older visitors; a revelation for younger people!

Katikati Heritage Museum is located on the corner of the Pacific Coast Highway (State Highway 2) and Wharawhara Road, just south of Katikati township.

Katikati is a 20 minute drive north of Tauranga.

We have an onsite café for breakfast, lunch or a snack before or after your visit, and a souvenir shop with a wide range of merchandise.

Phone us on (07) 549 0651
or email us: Email

 

 

 

©2012 Katikati Heritage Museum
Top photograph shows the 1899 visit to Katikati of the Governor, Lord Ranfurly (sixth from left). The man in the top hat is George Vesey Stewart, the founder of the Katikati settlement. Top photo, horse and carriage photo and bullock photo with kind permission of Katikati Library Archives