Glorious island, off an island

Surrounded by lush green foliage thriving in the hills around us, a curious kaka parrot watching on, Aunty Amo doesn't hesitate when I ask her why it was so important to save Kapiti Island, five kilometres off the coast of New Zealand. "It was what we call our 'turangawaewae', which means our place where you could survive."

Just north of Wellington, Kapiti Island is the home of her people, led here two centuries ago by the great leader Te Rauparaha (composer of the Ka Mate haka) and defended with blood during wars among Maori groups.

But as New Zealand authorities bought the island's land in the 20th century to create a nature reserve, Aunty Amo's grandmother refused to let go of a tiny 12-hectare parcel - not because she was against the environmental project, but because she wanted her family to keep a link to their ancestral home.

It's where Aunty Amo still lives, in the small community of about a dozen houses. "The heritage will never be not important," she says. "It's where we come from."

She also sees conservation as vital, and these days that is the focus of Kapiti Island. I arrive on its shores carrying no pests (everyone checks their backpacks before boarding the boat), as part of the tour company that Aunty Amo established with her brother decades ago. She's now grey-haired and walking with a stick, so it's her niece, Pania Barrett, who is leading us around today. The tall densely covered hills are literally calling to us, the cheeps and tweets of birds carrying through the canopy, but first Pania explains the significance of Kapiti Island.

Like all of New Zealand before humans arrived, there were no mammals here. It was just a land of birds, insects and reptiles.

But when the Maori arrived, bringing animals like rats and dogs, many of the native species were defenceless.

European arrivals also brought more predators, and turned forests into farms. The manuka and kanuka forests were replaced by sheep, whaling stations and even a golf course.

But in 1897, seeing the extinction of species on the mainland, New Zealand authorities began the process of buying the island to create a reserve with no foreign predators, allowing native trees to grow back and culling introduced animals like stoats and possums. It wasn't until a century later, in 1998, that Kapiti Island was declared completely pest-free.

"That's when the magic really happened," Pania explains. "Nothing was eating anything it shouldn't have been eating."

On a tree, a wood pigeon looks at our group nonchalantly as we stop to take photos of it. Centuries ago, before the Maori migration across the Pacific, its ancestors had never seen humans. Recent generations have only known us as friendly.

Around us, a robin flits by with a similar understanding of humans. Then a weka peacefully scratches around in the ground and a shelduck flies towards a lake. It's comforting to realise they don't know what we're capable of.

Hiking up to the top of a hill, I get a view out across the Tasman Sea, a dramatic coastline of cliffs dropping down on the western side of the island.

The slopes are gentler on the eastern side, which is why 2000 warriors from the mainland chose to land there when they attacked the island in 1824, trying to capture Kapiti from Te Rauparaha and his followers, including Aunty Amo and Pania's ancestors.

The islanders successfully fought off the attack, consolidating their presence here on their land, but even today nobody swims in the shoreside lake where the bodies from that day were interred. The nature and the heritage together.

"The 'putake', the roots, of a lot of our stories and the way that we see the world is all within 'te taiao', the environment," Pania tells me. "They're so interconnected that you just can't even separate them," she says.

If you want to spend even more time here, it's possible to do an overnight trip to Kapiti Island, with a range of accommodation options within the 12-hectare community. Night also brings the potential to see some of the hundreds of kiwi birds that hide in their burrows from day-trippers. But a day tour from Wellington offers enough for the casual visitor, with the 45-minute drive to the boat showing how easily accessible nature is from the city.

Getting there: The boat to Kapiti Island leaves from Paraparaumu Beach, about 45 minutes' drive from Wellington (transfers can be arranged). The only way to get to the island is with a boat operated by one of the two tour companies that have permission to land. A day trip with Kapiti Island Nature Tours, the main operator, costs about $170 for an adult (about $115 for a child).

Staying there: An overnight stay is from $360 per adult (from $200 per child). Accommodation options include glamping tents among manuka forest, small wooden cabins with shared bathrooms, or an ensuite room in the beachside bungalow.

Explore more: kapitiisland.com