Excellent campsite, powered spaces is a bonus!

Lost one mark for the fact that these aren’t allocated or marked, so you end up with a mishmash of campers in powered spots that don’t require power. In my case, even having booked in advance I was lucky to find the last powered spot due to campers parking in wrong place.

10/10 goes to the best Kauri walk in NZ! Must see.

Reviewed about 1 month ago

Amazing place to stay & one of the best campsites I’ve experienced in the north island!

But it’s at risk of closing down after 5 decades because people are NOT paying. Please donate or at least make sure you pay so it can stay open. People are taking advantage of a beautiful site with kiwis, kitchen and hot shower. Like where else do you find that!

Reviewed 8 months ago

Great place to stay!

All the facilities (e.g. hot shower and kitchen) were super. Also the location is nice, which allows you to walk a short loop track into the Kauri forest.

Reviewed 10 months ago

A nice spot, but expensive for what is there.

Nice to have a hot shower. The toilet was quite far away from our camper spot...but showers were close...kinda weird. The loop track was a nice walk. We were sad not to hear or see Kiwi, but that's nobody's fault.

Was so quiet luckily...our large camper only just fit on the tar-sealed site. Was nice to have a toaster to use. A bit run down and expensive, but nice for 1 night

Reviewed about 1 year ago

Good spot, but a bit over priced for the facilities available.

Hot showers, kitchen is functional. You can hear the kiwis at night :)

Reviewed about 2 years ago

Beautiful place we had the whole camp grounds to ourselves for the night very peaceful.

The walking track through the bush was lovey trees where impressive, Didn't see any kiwis but did hear a male calling in the distance. Facilities where great, clean and tidy and nice hot shower after a cold rainy day. Great place to stop on the way up to Waipoua forest.

Reviewed about 3 years ago

Excellent campsite, powered spaces is a bonus!

Lost one mark for the fact that these aren’t allocated or marked, so you end up with a mishmash of campers in powered spots that don’t require power. In my case, even having booked in advance I was lucky to find the last powered spot due to campers parking in wrong place.

10/10 goes to the best Kauri walk in NZ! Must see.

Reviewed about 1 month ago

Amazing place to stay & one of the best campsites I’ve experienced in the north island!

But it’s at risk of closing down after 5 decades because people are NOT paying. Please donate or at least make sure you pay so it can stay open. People are taking advantage of a beautiful site with kiwis, kitchen and hot shower. Like where else do you find that!

Reviewed 8 months ago

Great place to stay!

All the facilities (e.g. hot shower and kitchen) were super. Also the location is nice, which allows you to walk a short loop track into the Kauri forest.

Reviewed 10 months ago

A nice spot, but expensive for what is there.

Nice to have a hot shower. The toilet was quite far away from our camper spot...but showers were close...kinda weird. The loop track was a nice walk. We were sad not to hear or see Kiwi, but that's nobody's fault.

Was so quiet luckily...our large camper only just fit on the tar-sealed site. Was nice to have a toaster to use. A bit run down and expensive, but nice for 1 night

Reviewed about 1 year ago

Good spot, but a bit over priced for the facilities available.

Hot showers, kitchen is functional. You can hear the kiwis at night :)

Reviewed about 2 years ago

Nice location, OK facilities but not $20 per person worth.

We did have hot showers and there was a reasonable number of people camping. Only let down was some outside group slashed a tent and stole some back packs. They also raided the camp fridge and stole everything out of it. Should have a couple of cameras installed.

Reviewed almost 3 years ago

Beautiful spot, next to Kauri walk with possibility of seeing Kiwi.

We weren't so lucky but we sure heard them! Unfortunately we also heard fellow camper's music, including that of the camp host, a large part of the day! Birdsong is what we wanted to experience.

Don't expect hot showers if you go peak season - with approx 60 campers, hot water runs out pretty quick. I think for $20 a night, drinking water should be possible- you get at some other doc sites.

Also 3 toilets between 60 people cannot cope. They were clean, and miraculously no queues, but backed up on 4th day of our stay, at which point we packed up and left.

Camp host was pleasant and kept everything pretty clean, but I don't get staying in a place to see nature and then imposing a background of pop music on everyone.

TLDR: OK for one night, not for long family holiday. Bring solar showers!

Reviewed almost 4 years ago

Great site.

Big kitchen, sinks, fridge/freezer on site toilets and cold showers. Is a DOC campsite, so pay on honor system, was $20/person in an unpowered site, which seemed a bit expensive. Powdered sites available. Close to a great walk through the forest. Looked for kiwis, no luck for us but others did. Glow worms all over. Nice site overall

Reviewed almost 5 years ago

So glad I went down the west coast, and this was a lovely spot.

As others mentioned, some road noise, but not too bad. Facilities (kitchen! Power! Showers! Flush toilets!) really up there for a DOC site. Even had red cellophane to borrow to cover your torches for kiwi spotting... although prior visitors took it all and didn't return it :-(

Confusing info at time re: site price. One sign and DOC website had price as unpowered $15 pp/night, another had price as above, but with minimum occupancy of 2.

Reviewed almost 6 years ago

I don't know why the rankings are so good: no drinking water, facilities were disgusting, nobody around (so why serviced?), in the middle of nowhere and not nice at all.

Very expensive for nothing more than a hot shower.

Reviewed about 6 years ago

A decent place to stay.

Off season so only three other camper vans there. We were all in powered sites. Only a little off the road so some road noise. Showers and toilets were clean. Hot water! Not much else in the area so you take what you can get! :)

Reviewed over 6 years ago

Really cool little DOC campsite, good facilities especially powerful showers.

Kiwi and kauri forest is fun, entrance right on campsite.

Reviewed almost 7 years ago

We've never been at a DOC campsite with power, hot showers and a kitchen so that's very positive.

Doc campsite with power

Nevertheless, quite expensive if compared to normal campgrounds. It's more a carpark than a campground but the cheapest you can get in that area. Would stay there again.

Reviewed over 7 years ago

Nice little campsite with hot shower, kitchen and a nice Kauri Track.

Unfortunately we didn't see kiwis. So quiet at night. Be careful from which direction you arrive. We had 40 km of gravel road. $15 per person.

Reviewed over 7 years ago