Hundreds enjoy old-school beach party for 'cash poor'

Beach-goers who were treated to a free DJ and party session in Wellington’s Island Bay yesterday will be looking forward to the next open-air gig planned for Scorching Bay later this month.

A grass-roots family-friendly music event called Hoatu (to gift) made its way to Island Bay for the public to enjoy free-of-charge at the weekend.

Co-organiser Liam Ryan said it was set up for the public’s enjoyment, to spread cheer and positivity during the month people felt the most cash poor.

Known in the capital as DJ Luff, Ryan and Mike Takarangi, or DJ Takas, started to plan the venture in August of last year.

It struck the pair – while they were enjoying a 2018 Wellington festival – that they had DJ’d around the city for decades and had talked about setting up their own event for years but had never done it.

‘‘We thought, ‘we might as well’.’’

With the help of Wellington City Council, Radioactive.fm and Redbull they managed to get the idea off the ground, reining in their own gear to make it all happen.

But what was thought to take ‘‘a couple of hours’’ to set up quickly demanded about 100 hours and ‘‘reams of paperwork’’.

They managed to settle on two beaches for the event – first Island Bay because it ‘‘would be appreciated’’, followed by Scorching Bay on January 20.

‘‘We deliberately chose Sunday because it’s the poorest day of the week and we deliberately chose January because it’s the poorest month,’’ Ryan said.

At Island Bay yesterday, families joined in on the ‘‘old-school’’ games set up on the sand while the beats were pumped out.

Ryan ‘‘guestimated’’ about 500 people enjoyed the event but admitted it had been a little quieter than expected. Hoatu (to gift) will ramp up again on January 20 at Scorching Bay from noon.