A unique Maori cultural experience, Te Aratoi - which means 'The Arts Pathway' or 'The Living Arts Trail is a venture, which is intended to enlighten New Zealanders as well as international visitors, and will provide an authoritative introduction to the culture of the pre-European Maori. The tours will provide demonstrations of the myriad ways that Maori made use of their natural environment to fashion the garments, crafts and tools.

Surprisingly, in Auckland where one in five of the population is Polynesian, there has hitherto been no opportunity for people to participate in such a rich cultural experience, outside the confines of the Auckland War Memorial Museum. Te Aratoi is the brainchild of three Maori entrepreneurs: Riki Bennett , Rewi Spraggon & Renae Pocklington.

Riki, a park ranger with the Auckland Regional Council and based in the Waitakeres, has for years guided groups of schoolchildren and students through the local forest, explaining to them the ways his people used the trees and plants as resources. Rewi, a conservator at the Auckland War Memorial Museum for eight years, is a talented carver and craftsman who is an expert on traditional Polynesian building techniques. Though both are now Aucklanders, Riki's iwi affiliation is with Ngati Pikiao, a sub-branch of Te Arawa, and Rewi is Ngati Hine, affiliated to Nga Puhi. The skills of both men were nurtured by the elders of their people.

Each tour is tailor-made to the requirements of each specific group, but most will include an explanation that to the pre-European Maori, the forest - like the nearby coastline, estuaries and harbour - was a vast storehouse of food and raw materials, which local tribes drew from. Our knowledge of this ancestral lore is immense: we can explain which forest plant was used for which medicinal purpose, can demonstrate how to start a fire without matches, weave a food basket, make a rat trap or a fishing line, carve a flute from matai wood and draw a melodious tune from it.

We can create programmes ranging from a half-day experience to a weeklong experience including some interesting team-building days for those wanting to incorporate this into their programme. We can provide traditional (hangi- using manuka wood for fuel and heated andesite rocks for the cooking) or contemporary Maori cuisine, again dependant on tastes and budgets.