KEY POINTS:
Ngapuhi are celebrating having poet Hone Tuwhare home.
He is without doubt one of the tribe's most illustrious sons and will be buried today in the tribe's heartland having lain in state for two days at Te Kotahitanga Marae.
Hundreds have paid their respects since late Sunday evening when the body arrived from Dunedin after a farewell service in the South Island.
But Jimi Rapatini, nephew of the 85-year-old, said any tangi where laughter kept people up until the late evening had to be the sign of a life well lived.
"I was falling asleep in the end.
"There were songs of his poems people were singing - so beautiful.
"He's an icon to us."
It was the biggest tangi the marae had seen in years with the poet's ex-wife Jean McCormack and two of the couple's sons arriving yesterday.
Another son travelled from Dunedin with his father at the weekend.
Others to pay their respects were Tuhoe's Tame Iti, Shane Jones, Hone Harawira and Dover Samuels, Mr Rapatini said.
Joe Tongotea-Rapatini travelled with the body north from Auckland on Sunday.
"All the talk is - we're happy to have him home.
"It's our privilege to have him because Kaka Point has been his home all these years.
"I think the family know there will be more than a lifetime of our own looking after him."
Tuwhare will be joined tomorrow by the body of a worker at the marae who is believed to have died on Sunday night after working at the marae.
After a service at 1pm Tuwhare will be taken to Wharepaepae cemetery where his mother is buried.
