uninhabited island at the northern entrance to Cook Strait, 5 miles (8 km) off the mouth of the Waikanae River, southwestern North Island, New Zealand. It is 9 square miles (23 square km) in area and may be part of a land bridge that once connected North and South islands. Generally rugged and half forested, Kapiti rises from cliffs on its seaward edge to the peak of Titeremoana, 1,780 feet (543 m). The British navigator Capt. James Cook named it Entry Island in 1770. During the early 1800s it was a whaling station; but by 1897 almost all of the island had been included within a wildlife reserve.