Brown's Island

 
 

Brown's Island is a little uninhabited island just off Ladies' Bay in Auckland (about which I'll do another post).  When we used to go out fishing with Dad in a little dinghy he would always tell us that the island used to belong to his mother's family.  Her surname was Brown.

 

In Te Reo its name is Motukorea – Motu means island. I couldn't work out what the rest meant – Google thought I was referring to the country, Korea. It possibly means Oystercatcher Island. Wikepedia calls it Browns Island – but I prefer the apostrophe version.

 

It is a volcanic island. Only small boats (and kayaks) can access the island – and even then it's tricky.

 

In 1840 it was sold to William Brown and Logan Campbell. They set up a pig farm there. Brown returned to Blighty and was bought out by Campbell.

 

Eventually the island was gifted to the people of Auckland – in 1955 – a very good year.

 

In November 2018 a woman became stranded on the island and was only rescued after a fire she lit started getting out of control.