It is also a staging base for trips to a white heron sanctuary that is the only breeding location of white heron in New Zealand.
Mrs Mabel Winifred Gunn - matron of the Whataroa Hospital, South Westland.
The region has the only New Zealand nesting place of the kotuku (white heron), near Okarito Lagoon, visited by tours from the small farming township of Whataroa.