Visitors arrive for the dawn karakia at Waitangi. Photo / Getty Images
Waitangi took on a festive air as thousands of people gathered today for a day of celebrations.
While there were only a few dozen at the dawn karakia at the whare runanga, more began to emerge from tents on the lower Te Tii marae as the morning wore
on.
Hundreds of people were filing continuously over the one-lane bridge up to the treaty grounds and the upper marae.
Prime Minister Helen Clark left a breakfast with community leaders to step onto the double-hulled waka Te Aurere where she was ferried over towards the beach opposite Te Tii marae where about nine smaller waka paddled out to greet her.
As Miss Clark did a walkabout the treaty grounds after leaving the waka, Tuhoe activist Tame Iti, his son Toi and lawyer Annette Sykes held a "press conference" to call for support for the Maori sovereignty movement.
Iti is on bail on firearms charges following last year so-called terror raids.
There was a light, cool wind blowing at Waitangi as festivities got underway with a strong police presence but little signs of trouble.
Young men were being asked to take off gang colours, including bandanas.
The Navy has a large role to play in activities today with the navy band performing at the flagpole, a 21-gun salute was being fired from the treaty grounds while the naval ship Canterbury is anchored off shore.
- NZPA
