— Hahei Beach
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Each day shows its best three-hour window. Tap a day to see it hour by hour.
Go Borderline No go
Night names and their order differ between iwi and hapū. This page follows the general maramataka published by Te Papa, which uses the names most iwi share. Local knowledge from Ngāti Hei always comes first.
The green band is the best window and dotted lines are your limits. The pink fill between wind and gusts shows how gusty it is: the wider the gap, the more the wind is surging.
Cathedral Cove, Gemstone Bay and the coast around them sit inside Te Whanganui-A-Hei Marine Reserve, which doubled in size from 25 October 2025. Snorkel and look all you like, but fishing and taking anything is prohibited. Before fishing, spearfishing or gathering anywhere near Hahei, check the current boundary and catch limits in DOC's MarineMate app and the MPI fishing rules.
Reserve info on DOC → MPI fishing rules →Pick an activity above for sensible starting limits, or set your own. They're saved in this browser.
Been in the water? Enter the visibility you actually had, and future estimates for that spot shift toward it.
Wind, gusts and rain come from Open-Meteo's weather models. Swell, sea temperature and tide height come from its marine model, worked out for each spot.
No one forecasts underwater visibility, so this page estimates it from the last six hours of swell, the last day of onshore wind and the last two days of rain. Hahei faces east-northeast: a westerly cleans it up, a north-easter stirs it up.
Wind is in knots. Gusts are compared with the mean wind: gusts 7 kn or more above it are flagged gusty, 12 kn or more squally.
Each window is checked against your limits. Under 80% of every limit is a Go, up to 110% is Borderline, beyond that is No go.
These are estimates. Always look at the water yourself, dive with a buddy and fly a dive flag.
On the water there are two questions. Is it safe to go out? Wind and gusts (in knots) and total wave height are checked against your boat or kayak limits, giving a Go, Borderline or No go. A big gap between gusts and the mean wind is flagged as gusty or squally.
Will they bite? Each window gets a fishing score out of five stars, built from:
Every hour gets its own score, shown in the Best Time to Fish chart, so you can see the peak bite. The best window is the highest-scoring three hours you can safely get out in.
Wear a lifejacket, tell someone your plans and check the marine forecast before you launch.