The Cape Coast might be one of the healthiest places on the planet. Rumours persist that wave action along the stoney foreshore mingled with ozone charged breezes, vitalise the atmosphere extending life and health.

Dating back many decades many people have deliberately come to the Cape Coast for their health with the long life of some of its residents adding credibility to claims of an “elixir vitae (elixir of life) for which the district is renowned,” said one column in the Hawke’s Bay Daily Telegraph in July 1961.

In today’s terms the Cape Coast is ‘a blue zone’, a term coined by National Geographic, to describe special places where it’s much easier to strike a good balance between modern lifestyle, technology, healthy living and long life.

Here the Pacific Ocean, unobstructed for endless empty nautical miles to the coast of Argentina, charges the atmosphere as it licks and at times batters itself against the stony east coast beaches, including the aptly named Haumoana, the breath of the ocean or sea breeze.

Dr Reeves in Havelock North was a firm believer in the healthy properties of the area. He advised Fred Butcher and his wife Mabel (nee Sommerville) that if they wanted their infant son to survive into adulthood they should move to Haumoana because it would be good for his weak lungs.

The late Jack Butcher, aged 98-years when interviewed in 2016, was at the time the oldest resident in Haumoana and glad his parents had followed the doctor’s advice. He believed “the ozone wind…the pure wind off the sea” made all the difference.