Award recognition for a job well done
A Kerikeri man’s efforts to open up a track to a hidden waterfall have been recognised with a national award.
Rod Brown was the driver of a project to restore access to Wairere Falls, a stone’s throw from central Kerikeri, a popular picnic spot 60 years ago but all but inaccessible in recent times thanks to subdivision and regeneration of dense bush.
After years of effort a track was opened up in April last year, and last week Mr Brown’s work was recognised when members of the Walking Access Commission travelled to Kerikeri to present him with an Outdoor Access Champion Award.
Commission chairman John Forbes said many people were involved in the project, but without Mr Brown it probably wouldn’t have happened.
“You’re doing an amazing job,” he said, also acknowledging the land owners who had allowed the track to cross their land, in particular Richard and Emily Fladgate.
Mr Brown said the track’s success was the result of a lot of people and community groups working together for a common purpose, without letting egos get in the way.
The track was in fact two separate projects, one a public walkway and wildlife corridor near the Cobham Road bridge, created by Vision Kerikeri and Living Waters, the other a track from the bottom of Pa Road to the waterfall.
That was a Vision Kerikeri project, with the Kerikeri Rotary Club building the bridges, the Shadehouse nursery growing the seedlings, and the Friends of Wairoa Stream doing the track maintenance and weeding.
Mr Brown said the Friends had an average age 73, and refused to join committees or pay membership fees, but were happy to spend hours pulling weeds and fixing tracks. Without them, good soils and high rainfall meant the track would quickly be reclaimed by Kerikeri’s “pernicious weeds”.
While restoring access to the Wairere Falls had been important in its own right, the volunteers also had a long-term goal of recreating native bush to link remaining pockets of mature forest. In 50 years’ time Kerikeri would be bisected by a 4km wildlife corridor, he said.
Nor was the Wairoa Stream track the end of it. The groups were now working on another track linking Inlet Road and the waterfall via land bequeathed by John Dalton, while the track on the other side of the Cobham Road bridge would be extended as far as Campbell Lane (although Rotary would first have to build “a bloody big bridge” with a 16m span).
Walking Access Commission chief executive Eric Pyle said walking trails had far-reaching economic, health and community cohesion benefits. And people had a great time getting out and planning, building and walking the trails.