Brave Harold

The year is 1803. Harold McCartney accompanies his mother and missionary father on a voyage from England to Ruapuke Island in New Zealand's far south, where the Reverend is to set up a new mission. They sail as passengers aboard the convict ship Mae Rose, bound for the Australian penal settlement at Port Jackson (now Sydney). There they meet trading Maoris from New Zealand who have come to be with them on the final leg of their journey to New Zealand. But their ship is wrecked, and Harold finds himself alone on a desolate rocky coast. He takes shelter from the sea in a nearby fiord, where he meets both friends and enemies. Accompanied by an Aboriginal girl, Alkira, and the only Maori survivors of a battle between Maori and European sealers, Harold finally succeeds in crossing the mountains and finding his way to the southern New Zealand coast; the only place European ships may call, the place where his mother might be, the place where Maori Tipo has his home.