SHEDS DOWN, DOWN UNDER
Our sub-Antarctic islands are inhospitable places — you need shelter to survive. Apart from a single-season 13th- or 14th-century Māori visit, the history of the Auckland Islands is one of sheds. It divides naturally into three parts: sheds built by and for sealers and castaways, sheds dedicated to wartime coastal surveillance, and sheds facilitating recent conservation initiatives.
Discovered by Europeans in 1806, sealing gangs were soon being left on the islands, sometimes for long periods. Their shelters were improvisations of canvas and local materials; mostly southern rātā, grasses, and ferns.
Some gangs were forgotten, or abandoned, for years. At least those folk went ashore voluntarily and somewhat prepared. Myriad are the tales involving neither. Typically a vessel would pile into the western side of the island group, popularly charted as being 35 miles (56km)
