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The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Auckland Provincial District]

Mountains

Mountains.

Though the surface of the northern portion of the North Island is broken by numerous ranges and much hilly country, there are no mountains of any great height actually within the Auckland Province. Tongariro (6,500 feet), Ngauruhoe (7,515 feet), and even Ruapehu (9,008 feet), are, however, so near the boundary line that they have a marked climatic influence, the last-mentioned and most southern of the three being less than twenty miles within the Wellington territory.

The Kaimanawa Ranges, about twenty miles eastward of the mountains named, and for the most part in the Wellington Province, run across the border, and rise even in the Auckland Province to a height of upwards of 4,000 feet. Pureora (3,793 feet) is the highest peak of the Hurakia Range, which with others form the watershed, dividing the Mokau, Ongaruhe and Waikato basins; and Pirongia (3,156 feet) is the highest of the still more western ranges of Tawairoa and Hauturu, which are quite near the coast to the northward of Kawhia Harbour. The Moehau Ranges, running from Cape Colville (2,800 feet) to Weraiti (2,537 feet), include Te Aroha, a picturesque mountain of 3,176 feet. At the extreme north end is a range known as the Maungataniwha, which rises to nearly 2,500 feet. Pirongia is often snow-capped, and the Kaimanawas for a thousand feet down are snow-clad in winter.

As the thermal springs district, covering nearly a thousand square miles, is specially treated further on in these pages, reference to its hills and mountains, not one of which reaches two thousand feet, may be omitted here. That wonderful district has already been a source of much revenue to Auckland, and, as its fame spreads, its many attractions will prove still more profitable.
Lady Mountain and Waikato River.

Lady Mountain and Waikato River.

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