Three Sisters and Elephant Rock Beach
Tongapōrutu · Taranaki
This walk was suggested by the community and checked against the authority quoted above before it was published. The route line comes from official track data. New Plymouth District Council’s own wording: “All public places not described elsewhere in this schedule: Off leash and under control. (New Plymouth District Council, Dog Control Bylaw 2022, Schedule 1: Area Rules, the district-wide line that opens the schedule.) We checked the drawn beach line against NPDC's own dog control GIS layer rather than taking the wording on trust. Only two dog control areas exist anywhere on this coast and the walk is inside neither. "Tongapōrutu Domain: Leashed Control. All the Tongapōrutu Domain area seaward of the State Highway 3 bridge", which is the reserve up at the bridge, about 1.2 km east of the beach. And "Parininihi Marine Reserve: Leashed control during breeding season 1 August to 30 April. The area between the Waipingau Stream to the Clifton Road boundary", which is the coast on the far side of the Clifton Road boundary, the opposite direction to the stacks. So the beach north-east of the carpark is off lead under the district default, and the coast south-west of it is on lead for most of the year”. Evidence: the rule-setter’s own published wording. How we check dog rules.
Good to know
Dogs are allowed here. Watch for ground-nesting birds and stock, and read the signs at the gate.
About Three Sisters and Elephant Rock Beach
This short walk follows 1.3 km, near Tongapōrutu in Taranaki.
Park at the seaward end of Clifton Road, off State Highway 3 just south of the Tongapōrutu bridge, and walk down onto the sand. From there it is about 1.4 km north-east along the beach under the papa cliffs to the sea stacks, so roughly 2.8 km if you walk back the same way, and most people take an hour with stops. The Three Sisters stand about 600 m and 830 m along, and the rock the Elephant Rock name belongs to is another 400 m on. The elephant lost its trunk to the sea years ago, which surprises people who came for the postcard. The tide is the whole walk, not a detail of it. The beach is only walkable around low tide and you want to be heading back well before it turns, because the cliffs come down to the water in places and there is no line above the sand to escape onto. Check the New Plymouth tide table before you leave the car, give yourself the two hours either side of low water and no more. Inge's warning is worth repeating exactly as she gave it: the track down to the beach is slippery. It is soft papa mudstone and wet clay, and it does not care how good your boots are. What you get for the timing is a beach that does not really have an equal in Taranaki. Black sand, sculpted mudstone cliffs streaked with iron, caves and arches, and the stacks themselves standing out in the surf. Dogs love it: firm wet sand to run on, driftwood everywhere, and shallow water at the river end. On the dog rules, New Plymouth runs the opposite way to almost every other New Zealand council. Schedule 1 of its Dog Control Bylaw opens by declaring every public place not listed elsewhere to be off leash and under control, and this beach is not listed elsewhere. We checked that against NPDC's own bylaw mapping rather than the wording alone. Two things nearby are listed and both matter. The Tongapōrutu Domain, up at the highway bridge, is leashed control. And if you turn south-west from the carpark instead, the Parininihi coast beyond the Clifton Road boundary is leashed control every year from 1 August to 30 April for the breeding season. Off lead on the beach towards the stacks, lead on the moment you go the other way.
Graded easy, it climbs about 7 m overall, and takes about 16 min to walk.
Dogs are welcome here. This walk is on the map because Inge & Pip suggested it, and we checked it against the source above.
