Off the Top of My Head
By Paul Murray
The idyllic rural community of Karamea in the Buller District at the the top of the West Coast, is possibly the most remote on Mainland New Zealand in terms of its proximity to another town. Westport (Pop.6,000), the Capital of the Buller, is well over an hour’s drive away.
Recent media about Karamea and discussions of upcoming local events have highlighted the critical role tourism plays in supporting our region’s businesses and services. Remote towns like Karamea face unique challenges that set them apart from more populated areas, and the services they offer rely on a lifeline from visitors to their region.
In New Zealand, many small towns, just like Karamea, hinge economic survival on their environmental assets, natural beauty, and outdoor attractions. These places, blessed with breathtaking landscapes, depend on the success of their communities to harness and promote their natural resources while simultaneously preserving the quality of life, privacy, and well-being of their residents.
Karamea is no different, and tourism is the linchpin holding our community together. Travellers are drawn to Karamea to explore our iconic semi-tropical rainforests, the enchanting Kahurangi National Park, and the awe-inspiring Ōpārara Basin, along with our many other attractions. They come here to partake in outdoor activities and soak in our tranquil environment, briefly immersing themselves in our high quality of life.
While our history has seen us relying on extractive industries like forestry and mining, the present and future place greater emphasis on environmental stewardship rather than exploitation. Climate change is often in the limelight, but it’s just one piece of the puzzle. Now, the spotlight is on personal wellness, reduced reliance on exploitation, and a stronger connection to nature. Sustainability and regeneration of our natural environment and resources are paramount. The Karamea Community Plan powerfully underscored how vital our natural environment is to our community and how much we treasure our unique wonderland.
Our road access and maintenance depend on usage, and while the dairy industry plays an important role, tourism is equally vital. Access to our region hinges on having industries like agriculture and tourism, one producing marketable products locally and the other bringing income into the community through the money spent by visitors. Our population alone cannot justify essential services like the fuel station and supermarket, or nice-to-have businesses such as cafes, restaurants, and bars. The tourism and agricultural sectors are necessary to support local businesses and the services and facilities we, as residents, hold dear.
The tourism industry is the lifeblood of Karamea, diversifying our local economy, creating job opportunities, and keeping people employed in roles that cater to our visitors. By carefully managing, developing, and preserving our natural assets, we can chart a path toward prosperity that benefits the businesses that form the backbone of our community and provide the essential services and facilities we all rely on.
So, thank you to Juliette and Jason and their crew for providing such an excellent supermarket, thanks Vinnie for your fabulous café and delicious food and beverages, and thank you to the medical staff who do an incredible job of keeping our community healthy. Thank you to the Karamea Village and Little Wanganui pubs and the Last Resort, thanks to Tony and Sandy at Karamea Hardware for the amazing array of products you stock, thank you to Lena for keeping us all trim and tidy, the Information Centre for the fuel service, farm supplies, books and gifts, to Tony and Fifi for the refillery, to Rebecca at the Co-Op, the Higgs family and Karamea Tomatoes for freight and transport services, the magnificent Karamea Area School staff and teachers, Lee and Stu looking after our amazing Karamea Pulse Energy Centre. and our policeman, Alan Kees, thanks for keeping the peace. To the volunteers, fire, ambulance, sports coaches. fund raisers, quiz and raffle organisers, art exhibition helpers, winter-school teachers, the dedicated market stallers, youth group mentors, radio station DJs,…all the people who make our community fabulous.
Thanks also to Jessie Creedmore for working tirelessly to improve our lot and to Sanae Murray and the Pop-Up Gallery team for the fantastic exhibitions, the teachers and staff at Karamea Area School, the volunteers who run the tremendous Karamea Library and Museum, the swimming pool committee, golf club, helicopter services, airport management and the many other people working behind the scenes to keep Karamea awesome. However, it’s essential to remember that many of these services and facilities owe their viability to the support of tourism and the visitors who come to our region. In the delicate balance of sustaining our community, tourism is the indispensable partner.
The Rongolian Star 
Murray Family Life in Sunny Karamea
Anabela Rea, Oct 24 2023: STUFF NZ
From Tokyo to Karamea: The Start of the Road at the End of the World’s Longest Cul de Sac.
Sanae and Paul Murray say life is sweet in this remote town of 700 people.
For Paul Murray, ex-journalist, art photographer, keen horticulturist, cultural enthusiast, real estate agent, former bed and breakfast proprietor, and family man; life in the little South Island town of Karamea couldn’t be sweeter.
Murray, 57, has been living in the isolated settlement of 700 residents cocooned between the Kahurangi National Park and the Tasman sea since 2003. With his wife, Sanae Murray, 41, joining him in 2004, they’ve chosen to raise their family there, to give their children a free-range lifestyle. Their happy and confident kids, Diva and Winston, are now almost 12 and just turned 9.
With one road in and one road out, Paul likens the town, including its peculiarities, mindset and biological diversity, to that of an island.
“We’re at the end of the world’s longest cul-de-sac, and a place we like to think of as the start of the road,” he say. “We’re 100km north of Westport, basically, on a no-exit road.’
Paul first visited Karamea in 2000 when he was living in Japan, working as a journalist and art photographer.
“I came to New Zealand on a holiday in about 2000, and looked at a map and I thought ‘Wow, the town right up there.’ I was driving around the south, and I thought we’re gonna look at that. And so I drove up here and just thought, ‘What an incredible place.’ And I just fell in love with it.”
He’s not the only one to drive down the no-exit road and decide to never leave. Paul says there are “lots of stories about people doing that”, including a Canadian friend, who has since died, who came to Karamea for a picnic and ended up staying for 40 years.
When Paul returned to Tokyo, he says he couldn’t stop thinking about Karamea. The following year, he bought 32 hectares of bush that borders the national park, then went back to Tokyo to work to pay for it. Two years later he moved there permanently, with Sanae following not long after.
“It’s been an amazing journey,” he says. So what’s so great about Karamea?
“It is a very stunning place,” says Paul. “It’s very much like a geographical island. You’ve got the Kahurangi National Park on three sides and then it’s sealed in by the Tasman Sea.”
“It’s the warmest, driest place on the West Coast, because it’s the furthest north. And interestingly, we’re actually north of Wellington. Because in maps the South Island is a bit skewed, we’re actually just north of Wellington, and we’re east of Timaru. So it’s a bit of a local joke: Where are you from, mate? Oh, just north of Wellington. Oh, the Kāpiti coast? No, no. Karamea.’
Because it’s remote, Paul says the residents are independent, resilient, and “interested in sustainable living and growing food”.
It’s a world away from the bustling streets of Tokyo, where Paul and Sanae first met. For her, moving to Karamea meant a new language, a new culture, a new lifestyle … and directly disobeying her father’s wishes.
Long since settled now, the family enjoy weekly calls on a Sunday to Sanae’s parents in Tokyo, and go to visit every year. They speak Japanese on the Zoom calls but English around the house.
“Speaking Japanese to my wife is pointless because her English is far better than my Japanese,” Paul says.
The family have their own little farm that includes 1.6ha of grazing sheep and 2000m² of productive gardens.
Before Covid, the couple used to run motels in Karamea, including a 10-bedroom 1960s ex-maternity hospital which they operated as a bed and breakfast. Paul estimates they served up 2,500 meals a year using their own garden’s produce.
The ease of growing all manner of fruits and vegetables is one of the key things that encouraged Paul, who has a degree in horticulture, to move here.
“It’s warm and sunny, and you can grow almost anything here. I was absolutely astounded by the range of different crops people can grow here. They can grow bananas.”
His garden includes plants you wouldn’t expect to be viable on the West Coast, such as macadamia nuts, Ecuadorian coconuts, feijoas, passion-fruit, and blueberries.
Paul’s long-term goal is to become a kawakawa “pepper baron.” A collaborative partnership is already underway with a local cheesemaker to create a sensational kawakawa-infused cheese. Watch this space.
His career in abstract nature photography began with a Tokyo exhibition of holiday photos from New Zealand. Far from the “snaps next to a giant gumboot” that his friends expected, the images were artistic captures, a lens into a landscape that Paul loves.
Pushed on by his friends to exhibit, he says the experience was unexpectedly “a phenomenal success”.
“It was unbelievable, the jammiest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” he says.
“So many people came, we had to close the exhibition down. And we had to employ a security guard to let a certain number of people in at a time. There was a line outside the restaurant for a block and a half.”
“And then because of the line, it attracted media attention, and suddenly, all these journalists were turning up wanting to talk to the artist and I’m thinking, ‘Oh no, is that me?’ Suddenly, I’m an artist.”
“I ended up in Japanese photo magazines, and then in the popular press in Tokyo at the time. And from then on, I was just doing exhibitions all the time, to the point where I kind of burned out a bit. I lost the passion for what I was doing, because I ended up sort of feeling like I was doing it for other people rather than myself.”
He met Sanae at one of the exhibitions, so it’s safe to say the experience was still resoundingly positive.
Paul has returned to creating art in Karamea, and is also an enthusiastic supporter of the arts community there. Sanae has produced 11 pop-up exhibitions in the town and he estimates that around 10% of Karamea’s residents are artists.
Will the Murrays ever move? Not a chance.
They’ve hosted multiple Japanese television crews and an Italian documentary team, all curious to learn why they choose to live in a place some consider to be the ends of the earth.
Their “ramshackle, work in progress, building site of a house” is a 100-year-old, three-bedroom villa, at the western end of Karamea.
The town has all the amenities that Paul considers to be important, from “one of the best schools in New Zealand” to a Vidal Sassoon hairdresser, a supermarket, heated swimming pool, hardware store, gas station, cafe-restaurant, and “excellent medical care” available via the local nurses, with the rescue helicopter 20 minutes away for emergencies.
“It’s been 20 years I’ve been here, we’ve done a lot of stuff, and it’s been a wonderful, wonderful journey,” says Paul.
“I still wake up every morning, look across and see my wife is still sleeping and open up the curtains, look at and watch the sun rise over the forest and mountain peaks of the Kahurangi National Park, and think, ‘Shit, I’ve won life’s lottery.’”
“This place is my Shangri-la. Honestly, I love it. Love living here. Don’t want to go anywhere else.”
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