To celebrate 100 years of Rotary in Australia and New Zealand, we’ve teamed up with UNICEF to give life-saving vaccines to 100,000 children across the Pacific.
Kia ora, hello,
The start of a new month as we move closer to Christmas!
We have a busy few months ahead for the Rotary Club of Wānaka, with a visit from District Governor Keith
McIntosh in September, visit to Tititea Lodge and the Duck Race in October, Highland Park visit November and
then Xmas party in December.
A great night was had at our house on Tuesday 22 nd July, and I forgot to take photos as I was too busy talking. I won’t mention the two Rotarians that went to the Albie for dinner but after checking the bulletin arrived at Aubrey Road.
On Thursday 24 July, Fran and Gray hosted a wonderful evening of wine tasting. We finished with a glass of
Wendouree Shiraz 2000. Absolutely beautiful wine & privileged to have got to taste it. Thank you to Rosa
Stackhouse-Miller, the wine educator for sharing.
Many thanks to President elect Geoff for running the meeting on Tuesday 29 July as I attended to some business in Wellington. I hear Geoff has his L plates on! After sitting in traffic for 25 minutes from Lakes Hayes to the airport on Monday morning & then the consistent traffic congestion in the Wellington Region I appreciate why we live in Wānaka.
Next week on Tuesday 5 August we will be hearing from Stephanie Fieldsent, from Abbeyfield Trust. Then on
the 12 August it is our committee night.
The plan is for the Directors to meet on Sunday 17 August so can you please ensure your reports are filed early for Geoff to sort out the agenda. We will be discussing our fees for next year at this meeting.
Last night I attended a zoom meeting as part of the region Rotary Community Group. It is always interesting to hearing and learn what other clubs are doing and achieving in our Region. The Rotary Club of Wānaka
continues to be an amazing organization that serves our community.
Thank you to Peter and Fran who are busy working to prepare and updating the Club Directory for the next 12
months, this should be published later in the month.
Have a wonderful fortnight, safe travels to those overseas, keep warm and healthy for those in the Upper Clutha and we will see you all on Tuesday 5 August at the Albie.
Hei konā mai, goodbye for now.
Marie.
Club Duties
Duty roster notes.
1. All active members (except honorary members and directors/president) are eligible to be rostered for duties.
2. Rostered members are responsible for doing the duty or arranding a substitute.
3. Please advise Jenny Dickie of substitutes on 021 342 227.
4. Duties are for the rostered week only.
5. Duties are notified in the fortnightly bulletin.
CLUB DUTIES ROSTER
5th August
12th August
19th August
26th August
Attendance
Anne Linsay
Committee Meetings
David McKenzie
Carol Angland
Meet, Greet and Photography
Chris Scott
Committee Meetings
Helen Tait
Stuart Ayres
Introduce Speaker
Bernadette Costello
Committee Meetings
Fran Tate
Hannah Walker
Thank Speaker
Ken Johnston
Committee Meetings
Ian Shore
Rob Wilton
3 Minute Speaker
TBA
Committee Meetings
TBA
TBA
Raffle
Peter Harridge
Committee Meetings
Graeme Smart
Graeme Brown
Parting Thought
John McLean
Committee Meetings
Malcolm Baker
Duncan Boswell
Audio Visual Support
Julian Warren
Committee Meetings
Julian Warren
Ron Horner
From Sally Angus
Club Almoner. Note from Sally : I'm going to be in the Northern Hemisphere throughout the winter (late May until early September). While I'm away Rob Wilton has kindly agreed to take over as Almoner. Please do not hesitate to contact him at any time to keep him in the loop about any club members who might be in need of a little extra support. Many thanks. Rob is on 022 159 2096
Tititea Rotary weekend moved
The Rotary Tititea weekend has been moved to the first weekend of October, 4th and 5th due to a clash of dates.
John.M
Coming up - Club Night Activities
Tuesday 5th August 2025: Stephanie Fieldsend-Abbeyfield trust Wanaka
Having identified a dire need for affordable housing for over 65s in Wanaka,Stephanie founded a steering committee to build an Abbeyfield House in Wanaka in September 2023.
Since then, the committee has grown into workable portfolios and is a registered charity. Stephanie stepped down as Chair in late 2024 to take over the Lead Fundraising role and help drive the project forward as quickly as possible.
Her background is in education and training - in the field of communication and behavioural science.
The reality, is far from the myth around Wanaka. Those over 65 with no assets struggle to find affordable housing and live on pension. They either leave town, or stay on an ever-increasing wait list, dealing with financial insecurity as a daily thing.
It is easy to make assumptions around how people end up over 65 without assets. But, death, divorce, medical events and other life traumas can affect anyone and everyone, at any time!
Abbeyfield House is the perfect solution – it provides co-housing for 14 individuals to live on their pension with all utilities and food included, as well as their own private ensuite room.
The house will be built by the community for the community. Our task is to dispel the myths, change perception, and foster understanding that it is our diversity that gives Wanaka its heart.
Tuesday 19th August 2025: Kelly Budd. New members Talk
Tuesday 26th August 2025: Richard Gray - Leprosy
Tuesday 16th September: Keith McIntosh Assistant Governor Central Otago Lakes.
"Where Rotary is at in the South Island and what we need to do to sustain Rotary in the future".
Previous Club Night Activities
Tuesday 29th July 2025: Jose Cranfield: Wanaka Storm Water and litter Traps-plastics free July
On Tuesday night, we were treated to a very informative discussion on the condition of our local lakes with a particular emphasis on Lake Wanaka. She also gave us an understanding of how her organisation was structured and their major objectives.
Needless to say, but our Lake (and Lake Hawea) are inundated with huge numbers of plastic particles and other harmful contaminants and the problem is increasing at a very fast pace.
She then offered advice on what we, as Wanaka citizens, could do to reduce the harm in our lake and that alone proved extremely interesting.
Jose talked engagingly about her work in WAI Wanaka, as their Urban lead contact. WAI helps within the catchment district with a team dedicated to monitoring water issues - sediment, pollution and quality - and riparian planning and planting. They get funding from MPI, QLDC and Central Lakes Trust for their work. Her area is helping them assess the
Urban catchment issues and looking at Lake and River pollution with regards to the towns in the catchment area.
There is a lot of run off from streets into the lake, with a varied amount of rubbish and debris, and a lot of sediment. Her team organises lake clean-ups and tracks the amount of rubbish getting into the lake.
They have tracked down the sources of various small plastic items via litter traps in monitoring stations around the town. A notable finding is that there are microfibre plastics - in particular fine threads - in the lake, and small amount of which - about 1 fibre per litre - gets past filters into the drinking water even with best efforts to filter it out. Its possible that some of this is being deposited on the surrounding mountains and glaciers - literally blowing in on the wind.
Tracking and stopping the pollution and trying to stop sediment - especially from building-site run off - will remain their targets for the coming years.
It was well received talk, and Jose would be happy to give us a regular
update if requested.
Many thanks to Geoff Mcleay, Tony Johnston and Geoff Tomkins for the reviews and photo of Jose Cranfield's presentation
Rotary Club Wine Tasting Evening
Our wine tasting evening, originally planned for Bastille Day was finally held on Thursday 24th July. It was a brilliant night run by well know Sommelier Rosa Stackhouse-Miller. Rosa presented some seriously good red wines from Tuscany, Argentina, Clare Valley in Australia and Sicily. A huge thank you to our hosts Fran and Gary Tate.
Thanks to Geoff. M for the photos and update
Further to my announcement at last Tuesdays Rotary meeting. Wānaka Community Resilience Group (previously known as Wānaka Community Response Group) is looking to convene a session with a number of relevant local groups who would be useful support to our community in the case of an emergency (Earthquake, flood, storms, wildfires, landslides etc.)
The purpose is to meet to talk about the WCRG role and our group role in the community, our personnel, skills, resources and what WCRG can do all do in peace time and in an emergency.
Emergency Management Otago will also be present at the table to support the conversation.
The meeting will be at the Rugby Club Rooms on the 20th August at 7pm and they are anticipating it will go for an hour. They are hoping to have a mix of groups that may be able to assist our community in some way should there be an emergency.
There is no need to register, simply just turn up. If you have any specific agenda points that you would like to raise, please let me know so I can ensure WCRG facilitate them into the session. It would be great to see our Rotary Group well represented on the evening.
Geoff McLeay
Editor's note:Rotary's presence has been hard to find during travels in Western Australia and Bali, however this rather impressive seating was discovered on Bali's Sanur walkway celebrating District 3420's contribution to a Bali Waste Management Training Centre
Greetings from D9815, Melbourne and Gippsland Areas. My local club is Maroondah, about 30km NE of Melbourne. Valda, I am an aviation nut, having attended the Royal International Tatoo (RIAT) in the UK, and a regular attendee to Avalon International Airshow (near Geelong) and Warbirds Downunder at Temora (NSW). I have always coveted attending Warbirds over Wanaka and have started looking forward to my options for 2026 and attending WOW over the Easter Weekend. I notice from the club website that the club assists in the running of the event, although there is no indication of exactly what you do. If i was to indicate that I would be available to assist over the weekend, would that be something your club would entertain? As I did when I went to RIAT in 2016, i was hosted by Rotarians in the near area and wonder if amongst your members there would be a Rotarian willing to host me for 3-4 day? I will have my own means of transport over the stay period. If home hosting isn't available, do you have connections in the accomodation industry where you might suggest i look for somewhere to stay? I look forward to your earliest favourable response. Kind regards PP Andrew Brownlie roo48@aapt.net.au +61 (0)478637661
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