Motuareronui / Adele Island is a small island off the coast of the

South Island The South Island ( , 'the waters of Pounamu, Greenstone') is the largest of the three major islands of New Zealand by surface area, the others being the smaller but more populous North Island and Stewart Island. It is bordered to the north by ...

of New Zealand. It is contained within

Abel Tasman National Park Abel Tasman National Park is a national park at the north end of New Zealand's South Island. It covers of land between Golden Bay / Mohua and Tasman Bay / Te Tai-o-Aorere, making it the smallest of National parks of New Zealand, New Zealand's ...

. The navigator and botanist

Jules Dumont d'Urville Jules Sébastien César Dumont d'Urville (; 23 May 1790 – 8 May 1842) was a French List of explorers, explorer and French Navy, naval officer who explored the south and western Pacific, Australia, New Zealand and Antarctica. As a botanist an ...

charted the island in 1827. In the 1850s, the island and nearby Fisherman Island were purchased by a Nelson customs collector, but were later confiscated by the government due to misuse of funds. Both islands became scenic reserves in 1895. These islands shelter the waterway known as the Astrolabe Roadstead from

Tasman Bay / Te Tai-o-Aorere Tasman Bay (; officially Tasman Bay / Te Tai-o-Aorere), originally known in English as Blind Bay, is a large V-shaped bay at the north end of New Zealand's South Island. Located in the centre of the island's northern coast, it stretches alon ...

, making it popular with kayakers and boaties.

Etymology

Dumont d'Urville named the island after his wife Adele Pépin, and also named the adjacent Fisherman Island, along with the Astrolabe Roadstead, which he named after his ship, the ''Astrolabe''. In August 2014, the island name was officially altered to Motuareronui / Adele Island. ''Motu'' means island, ''arero'' is a tongue and ''nui'' is big; hence, ''Motuareronui'' literally means the big island shaped like a tongue, which makes Motuareroiti / Fisherman Island (with ''iti'' meaning little) the little island shaped like a tongue; however, in his comprehensive book on natural and cultural history of Abel Tasman National Park, Philip Simpson suggests the two islands are incorrectly named, as follows:

References

Abel Tasman National Park Islands of the Tasman District Islands of Tasman Bay {{Tasman-geo-stub