The history of Cape Foulwind reads like a roll call of European explorers in New Zealand waters. Abel Tasman, the first European to sight it, named it Rocky Cape in December 1642. His artist Isaack Gilsemans sketched the rocky islets to the north, which the Dutch inscription identified as the Rocky Point. Nearly two centuries later, in January 1827, the French explorer Jules Dumont d'Urville renamed those same islets Les Trois Cloches, the Three Bells. By 1839, James Wyld's map had anglicized them to Three Steeples. Sealers, who had been working these waters since at least 1826, knew them simply as Black Rocks. Each name captured something true about the place: its rocky harshness, its ecclesiastical silhouette, its dark granite. Cook's contribution, Cape Foulwind, added the invisible but ever-present element that anyone who visits quickly learns to respect.

The Cape Foulwind Walkway runs 3.4 kilometres from Tauranga Bay to the lighthouse car park, tracing the cliff tops above a coastline that teems with wildlife. The main attraction is the thriving colony of New Zealand fur seals, known in te reo Maori as kekeno, that haul out on the rocks at Tauranga Bay. The cliffs and small offshore islands also serve as roosting and breeding grounds for Australasian gannets, sooty shearwaters, fluttering shearwaters, and fairy prions. On Wall Island, a small rocky islet offshore from the seal colony, little penguins, or korora, nest alongside seabird colonies. From the walkway, visitors occasionally spot Hector's dolphins in the nearshore waters and orcas cruising farther out, likely drawn by the fur seal colonies. The rich waters around the Three Steeples and Black Reef support rock lobster, blue cod, gurnard, sharks, and snapper, all known locally by their te reo names: koura, rawaru, kumukumu, and tamure.

The limestone that makes Cape Foulwind dramatic also made it industrial. As early as 1924, the Grey River Argus reported plans to mine and process limestone and marl deposits here. But it took decades of proposals, foreign investment, and false starts before the British company Tunnel Portland Cement committed in 1955 to build a plant. The factory would produce 120,000 tons of cement annually, employ 200 workers, and consume 40,000 tonnes of Buller coal each year. At a capital cost of two and a half million pounds, it was a major investment in a remote region. Production began in November 1958, with the official opening on 15 February 1959. For 58 years, the cement works anchored the local economy. Then in 2013, owner Holcim announced closure plans, and in June 2016 the plant ceased operations, costing 105 jobs. The ruins of the works remain near the cape, a monument to the boom-and-bust cycles that have characterized the West Coast economy since the gold rush era.

A lighthouse stands on a prominent site on the headland, registered as a Category 2 Historic Place. Its effectiveness is measurable: there are no recorded wrecks on the Three Steeples or Black Reef, the 28 granite islets that rise to just over 20 metres about two kilometres north of the cape. That is not to say the rocks have been entirely kind. In 1881, the paddle steamer Charles Edward was holed and had to be towed to Westport. In 1946, the Union Steamship collier Karepo stranded on the rocks in thick fog, though she was eventually floated off. A navigable channel runs between the cape and Black Reef, but the combination of wind, swell, and fog makes it a passage best attempted with care. In the lee of the cape, eastward toward the Buller River mouth, lies Carters Beach, claimed to be the only safe swimming beach on the entire West Coast of the South Island. The contrast is instructive: on one side, the full fury of the Tasman Sea; on the other, a sheltered strand where families can wade without fear.