Kaitangata is famous as a black gold town, with coal mining still at its heart. There is a memorial in the old southern cemetery to the 34 men killed in an explosion in 1879, one of the New Zealand’s worst coal mining disasters.
A coal box and plaque commemorates Frederick Tuckett’s discovery of Kaitangata’s cliff of coal in 1844; a short drive from Balclutha.
Kai is the start or finish of the Forgotten Coastal Highway.
