RJ: There is a very thin layer of topsoil, covering a one-meter thick layer of clay and hard pan, covering some sort of ash material. The ash material looks sandy in color, and is easy to move around when dry, but it soaks up the moisture and responds like bread dough after it's been wet. Luckily, we've only had to move dirt on a few of the fairways.
mdugger: I don't know how to answer your question exactly. My main problem right now is disappointment, to be looking at a great golf hole and be told we can't build it, when there appeared to be nothing in the way at first. I wish they had done all the archaeological homework before I saw the site, so I would never have had the hole in mind.
I do respect the history of a site and the people who have gone before. This "hanging valley" below the line of the cliff is a very attractive spot, and so it's no great surprise in hindsight that the Maori found it attractive as well.
However, as I understand it, the "sensitive site" is a mound which was built to store food -- essentially an ancient refrigerator. It's hard for me to understand why this must be saved in perpetuity, and we have to keep the golf course 100 feet away from it. There are several other similar sites at Cape Kidnappers which will also remain untouched.
This is the odd fact of life as a golf architect: every different place you work has its own rules and its own values. The New Zealanders don't seem to care at all about wetlands like we do, for example -- probably because they haven't filled a significant percentage of theirs in over the last 30 years of development -- so we can do a couple of things at Cape Kidnappers that we couldn't in the States.
My favorite was when we were working on Apache Stronghold, the archaeologist (who was Apache) showed us some rock check dams in the desert washes, which he said were remnants of a WPA project in the 1930's -- essentially, "making work" for the unemployed in the Depression. Then he said that they probably wouldn't be considered too important for us to touch!!