Tolaga Bay (Maori: Uawa) is both a bay and small town on the East Coast of New Zealand's North Island located 45 kilometres northeast of Gisborne and 30 kilometres south of Tokomaru Bay. The region around the bay is rugged and remote, and for many years the only access to the town was by boat. Because the bay is shallow, a long wharf - the second longest in New Zealand (600m) after the Tiwai Point wharf at Bluff (1,500m) - was built in the 1920s to accommodate visiting vessels. The last cargo ship to use the wharf loaded a cargo of maize in 1967. In the 1830s there was a thriving flax trade involving early European traders like Barnet Burns. By 1998, the wharf had deteriorated and was in danger of being closed. In response, the Tolaga Bay Save the Wharf Trust raised funds and gained technical help to restore it. The wharf has now been re-opened and the refurbishment project should finish by May 2013. The Uawa River reaches the Pacific Ocean in the middle of Tolaga Bay. There is a bar at the river mouth with around 2 metres of water at high tide. The Uawa River is called the Hikuwai further up. Tributaries include the Waiau and the Mangaheia. In 2018 heavy rains washed huge amounts of discarded forestry timber (or slash) down the Uawa River, which choked up the estuary, covered the beach, and caused extensive damage to farms and houses. An island in the bay was originally named Spöring Island by Cook, after his expedition's assistant naturalist and instrument maker, Herman Spöring, a Finnish botanist. It is however today again known by its Māori name, Pourewa. The town is a popular holiday spot. Its population is predominantly Māori, a centre of the Te Aitanga-a-Hauiti iwi and home of Ariki - Te Kani a Takirau and Tohunga - Rangiuia.
