Matiu / Somes Island
Before you are allowed to land, you empty your bag on the ferry and check the seams for seeds and insects, and then you scrub and disinfect your boots in a small room at the top of the wharf. It is the most memorable arrival anywhere near Wellington, and it is also the point of the place. Matiu has spent a hundred and fifty years keeping things out — smallpox, then people the government had decided were enemies, then animal disease, and now rats. Only the direction has changed.
Last updated 2 September 2026
Why it matters
Kupe named this island Matiu about a thousand years ago. Europeans renamed it after Joseph Somes, a deputy governor of the New Zealand Company, and in 1997 the Geographic Board gave it both names at once, which is why it is written the way it is.
Its position — a 24.8-hectare hill in the middle of a harbour, close enough to see the city and far enough to be genuinely separate — has made it useful for one purpose after another, and every one of them was about separation. New Zealand's first inner-harbour lighthouse went up here in 1866. Then a quarantine station, then an internment camp in both world wars, then an anti-aircraft battery, then a quarantine station for animals.
The quarantine station began with a single ship. In 1872 the immigrant vessel England arrived with smallpox aboard; passengers and crew were held in temporary shelters, and a permanent station followed. It was busiest between 1872 and 1876. Arriving immigrants were made to sit in a smoke house in chlorine, potassium nitrate and sulphur fumes for ten minutes to kill lice, and DOC's own account of who is buried on the island is quietly devastating: “The young were most at risk as reflected in the ages of the people buried on the island.” A memorial cairn went up in the 1970s; the cemetery was on the slopes below it.
And one man was not even allowed on Matiu. In 1903 Kim Lee, a Chinese fruiterer suspected of leprosy, was put on Mokopuna, the far smaller rock just off the northern end, and supplied by a basket on a wire. He died there in 1904 after six months alone. You can see Mokopuna from the track.
Myth: you can turn up and get on a boat
Reality: booking is required and a same-day walk-on is not guaranteed. DOC also caps visitor numbers on busy days to protect the island, and East by West cancels sailings in severe weather — which in Wellington is not a rare event. Book, and have a second plan for the day.
Myth: it is a nature reserve with a few old buildings on it
Reality: it is a place that spent most of a century separating people from other people. Around 300 prisoners were held here in the First World War, most of them German nationals — many with homes, families and businesses in New Zealand, reclassified as enemy aliens and housed in the old quarantine barracks. In the Second, Germans again plus a large number of Italian and Japanese nationals. The wildlife arrived last.
Myth: the sailing times you found online are the sailing times
Reality: the timetable is seasonal and states its own expiry. The schedule running as we write is valid from 23 August to 31 October 2026 and will be replaced. We are deliberately not printing times on this page, because anything we published would be wrong within weeks. Check East by West's departures page for the day you want.
What it's like
The crossing takes about twenty minutes and the island arrives before you are ready for it — a steep green hill with a wharf at the bottom and a scatter of white buildings on the ridge. Then the ferry pulls away and the sound of the city goes with it, and you are on a scientific reserve with a few dozen other people and several hundred years of unfinished business.
A single gentle track loops the island, and it is the sort of walk that keeps interrupting itself. The lighthouse. The gun emplacements, where four 3.7-inch heavy anti-aircraft guns were mounted in 1942 — capable, in the words of DOC's own account, of putting a shell to ten thousand feet in fourteen seconds. They were manned from January 1943 to September 1944 and were never once fired in anger. When they came out, the internees came back.
The buildings are the strange part. Quarantine barracks that later held prisoners. Caretakers' houses. An animal quarantine complex, whose maximum-security building is currently closed on earthquake risk. And the small memorial to people who crossed the world in the 1870s and got no further than a hillside in a harbour.
What lives there now was put there deliberately: tuatara, kākāriki, North Island robin, little blue penguins and wētā, on an island that had been grazed and cleared and is being planted back. The penguins have nest boxes near the wharf. The tuatara are where they choose to be.
How to visit
The island and its visitor centre are open daily, 8.30am to 5pm. Ferries run seven days a week between Queens Wharf in the city and Days Bay on the eastern shore, calling at the island in between, so you can go out from one and come back to the other.
Fares, valid from 15 May 2026 and including the $6 DOC visitor fee: adult NZ$42 return, child 5–16 NZ$24, SuperGold NZ$6, Connect Concession NZ$24. Infants under five travel free but must still be booked onto the sailing.
Most visits are two to two and a half hours ashore, which is enough for the loop and the buildings without hurrying. The longer weekend sailing leaves Queens Wharf at 1pm and Days Bay at 1.30pm and gives you just over three hours, which is the one to take if you can.
The biosecurity check is not a formality and it is done by you. On the ferry, every visitor completes a self-check — bags, pockets and prams, for rodents, insects and plant material. On arrival you pass through the Whare Manuhiri, the visitor biosecurity room at the top of the wharf, to clean and then disinfect your footwear before you go any further.
Do the useful part before you leave the mainland. DOC asks visitors to check bags, clothes and footwear for pests before travelling, and the single most valuable thing you can do is knock the dried mud out of your boot treads at home. A seed in a tread is the whole risk, and the room at the wharf is the last line rather than the first.
On the timetable, and why we are not printing one. East by West's own departures page carries an expiry — the schedule as we write runs from 23 August to 31 October 2026 and will then be replaced. Any times we published here would be wrong within weeks, so we have not published them. Check the operator on the day.
Weather cancels sailings, and Wellington provides plenty of it. If the day looks marginal, ring before you travel to the wharf.
Making the most of it
Walk the loop anticlockwise and read the memorial cairn early, before the wildlife starts distracting you. Everything on the island reads differently once you know that people are buried on it.
Look for Mokopuna. It is the small island off the northern end and it is where Kim Lee was left in 1903. There is nothing on it. That is rather the point, and it is the single hardest thing on the island to look at once you know.
The gun emplacements are worth ten minutes. They are concrete and unglamorous and they were the reason the internees were moved to Pahiatua in early 1943 — and the reason they came back in September 1944 was that the guns were taken away. The two facts are the same fact, and it takes standing there to feel it.
Give the penguins a wide berth and the tuatara your patience. Kororā nest near the wharf and the boxes are not an exhibit. Tuatara are visible if you slow down and look at the warm edges of things rather than the middle of the track.
You can stay the night. The historic Caretakers Cottage is hireable as overnight accommodation, reached by a dedicated overnight drop sailing arranged through East by West and booked in advance. An island of this size with nobody on it after five o'clock is a genuinely unusual thing to be able to buy.
Come back by the other shore. Sail out from Queens Wharf and return to Days Bay, or the reverse — Days Bay has a beach, a café and the Eastbourne shoreline, and it turns a two-hour island visit into a whole day on the harbour.
Nearby
The ferry leaves from Queens Wharf, which is a fifteen-minute walk along the waterfront from Te Papa — and the two make an unusually coherent day, because Te Papa's natural-history galleries explain what happened to New Zealand's wildlife and this island is one of the places it is being undone.
The closer comparison is Zealandia, which does the same job on the mainland behind a fence rather than behind a stretch of water. If you are choosing between them and have one day, take Zealandia — it is bigger, easier to reach and does not depend on the weather. Take Matiu if you have two, or if the history interests you as much as the birds.
Everything else is on the Wellington page.
A final word on Matiu / Somes Island
Book the weekend sailing, do the boot-cleaning properly rather than politely, and read the cairn before you walk the loop. This is not a nature reserve that happens to have a history. It is a history that has been given back to the birds.
Andrew + Margaret
- Wellington Overview
- Zealandia Te Māra a Tāne Overview
- Te Papa Tongarewa Overview
- Cost of visiting New Zealand Practical
Do I need to book?
Yes. East by West requires booking and does not guarantee a same-day walk-on, DOC caps visitor numbers on busy days, and infants under five travel free but still need a place on the sailing. Sailings are also cancelled in severe weather, so have a second plan.
What is the biosecurity check?
Two stages, both done by you. On the ferry you self-check bags, pockets and prams for rodents, insects and plant material. On arrival you pass through the Whare Manuhiri at the top of the wharf to clean and then disinfect your footwear. Knocking the dried mud out of your boot treads before you leave home is the most useful part.
How long do I get on the island?
Usually two to two and a half hours, which covers the loop track and the buildings. The longer weekend sailing — 1pm from Queens Wharf, 1.30pm from Days Bay — gives just over three hours, and is the better option if your dates allow it.
What will I see?
Tuatara, kākāriki, North Island robin, little blue penguins and wētā, all reintroduced to an island that had been cleared and grazed. Plus the 1866 lighthouse, the 1942 gun emplacements, the quarantine and internment buildings, and a memorial cairn to the people buried on the slopes below it.
Can I stay overnight?
Yes. The historic Caretakers Cottage can be hired, reached by a dedicated overnight drop sailing arranged in advance through East by West. The island empties at five o'clock, which makes it a rare thing to be able to book.