Golden Bay lies at the edge of the junction between the Tasman Sea and Cook Strait. It stretches for 45 kilometres from the long sand spit of Farewell Spit in the north to Separation Point in Abel Tasman National Park at its southern extremity. Beyond this point, the larger of the two bays at the top of the South Island, Tasman Bay, begins.
The northern part of the bay is largely devoid of population; the southern part contains the populous but small plains around the mouth of the Takaka River. Between the two lies the small town of Collingwood. Other than the Takaka River, the Aorere River is the main watercourse to reach the sea at Golden Bay.
Dutch explorer Abel Tasman anchored in this bay in 1642. However, the resulting hostile encounter with the local Māori when a party from his ships tried to land caused him to bestow upon it the name Murderers Bay. English explorer James Cook included the bay as part of Blind Bay in his first journey, but in 1873 realised that it was in fact the location of Murderers Bay. The French explorer Jules Dumont d'Urville appears to have changed the name to Massacre Bay. In the 1840, it was for a time known as Coal Bay following the discovery of coal. With the discovery of gold in Collingwood, the name changed to the current name of Golden Bay.[1]