NEWS FROM THE POINT WELLS LIBRARY

Hopefully everyone had a good break over the holiday period and now I guess looking forward to Easter. We may be shocked and it could be dry – or is that in our dreams.

Exciting news is that the council have installed new blinds in the library which are looking fabulous. They are also definitely going ahead with the repainting of the inside of the library and replacing the lighting with LED. They will also be attending to the flood damage in the hall kitchen plus decking and seating outside. In addition to this they will be working on upgrading the parking area outside the hall. This will all be done as one project and the hall complex will be closed for, we believe, a month while this work is being carried out. Once we get a firm date for the start of the project we will then attempt a plan so our wonderful library members won’t be too put out. We believe it will be the beginning of May.

Unfortunately, they are not able to extend this wonderful renovation to re-carpeting. I feel there is quite possibly another fund-raising film night in the offing.

DonatingBooks

We are looking for a small amount of books to put on our 'For Sale’ trolley and at the store, but we are not asking for a large collection as for the end of year sale.

MailingList

The Point Wells Library works under the umbrella of the Point Wells Ratepayers. If you live in Point Wells and become a member of the library, your email address is made available for village communications - for example an email copy of the Crier, the Connoisseurs’ Dinner and so on. If you do not want to receive these communications, it is simple for you to ‘unsubscribe’from the MailChimp list.

MatakanaWater

Thank you so much to the person who had a delivery from Matakana Water and chose the library to direct their donation to. Hopefully it will stop raining soon and more people will need water!

JuniorLibrary

The junior section of the library has been steadily ticking along through the school holidays. There were many new additions after the book sale of donated fiction to boost book numbers, and a trip to Matakana Village Books has been done, so brand-new titles for juniors and teens are on the shelves now! As always, if you would like to see a particular book in the library, please leave a note with the library staff.

We would like to trial opening the library on a Friday morning, 10am-12noon, for Junior Time. There will not be activities, but rather a time for pre-schoolers and their parents/caregivers to choose some books. Any questions or comments feel free to get in touch with Keren on 021 471 277.

The adult section of the library also has a selection of new books recently added to the collection.

AucklandBulkLoan

There is a new selection of books on loan to us from Mahurangi Library. These will be on our shelves for the next 3 months. If you would like books by a particular author please leave a note for the library staff and we will do our best to request them. It is probably not possible to borrow brand new books but we are having good success with books which are 1 or 2 years old.

Libraryhours

• Monday evening 5pm – 6pm

• Wednesday morning 10am - 12pm

• Friday afternoon 3pm - 5pm

• Saturday morning 10am – 12pm

Vanessa Barber pointwellslibrary@gmail.com

Matakana Fire Brigade

Wow, what a start to the year we have had!!

2023 was welcomed in just before midnight on New Year’s Eve with a callout to a large scrub fire in Martins Bay, caused by…. yep, you guessed it, fireworks!!!!

The blaze grew quickly to such an extent that it was attended by 14 appliances and operation support units. Many were from local brigades, but also some trucks travelled up from Auckland.

Our station sent both our fire truck and the water tanker to assist. With no reticulated water supply near the fire, our tanker ran a water shuttle from the nearest reticulated water supply in Algies Bay and back to the fire ground.

Some of our crew remained on the job until after 7am the following morning and ultimately our water tanker remained on the scene for the following 4 days with an Auckland city career firefighter crew in attendance, as there were some flareups that caused ongoing concerns.

This job meant a considerable number of volunteer staff from both our brigade and neighbouring brigades who were unable to celebrate the new year in with family and friends. Bugger!

The dramatic increase in the holiday population unfortunately meant a corresponding increase in callouts for the Brigade. We had a very busy January.

Bearing in mind that some of our crew were themselves away on holiday which meant the heavy workload fell on the few crew that were left. So, many thanks to them for helping the community through the holiday period.

The callouts were for a variety of medical events, water incidents, which unfortunately included a drowning, and a nasty head-on vehicle collision on Matakana Rd. This resulted in a road closure for many hours while patients were extracted from motor vehicles and treated.

One person in a very serious condition was airlifted out by Westpac Rescue helicopter. The road was completely unpassable due to the location of the crashed vehicles. Once the crash occupants had been extracted from the vehicles and removed by ambulance or helicopter, the scene was then controlled and examined by the Police Serious Crash unit.

You may have been one of many which had to travel the long way around via Wellsford. I know I did when travelling down to Auckland later that evening. Annoying and frustrating I know, but spare a thought for the accident victims whose road to recovery will be far, far longer.

Finally, we closed out January with the cyclone that did so much damage in Auckland and the Coromandel. In general, I think that we in Point Wells largely dodged a bullet and we could have easily copped much worse.

As I have said before, make sure you keep those gutters and drains cleared as next time we might not be so lucky. Now where did I put my gumboots…….??

Chris Jensen

Point Wells Garden Circle

It's been a crazy summer season for gardeners, with some plants loving the rain (so many cucumbers to share!) and others turning up their toes and objecting to having their feet in water too often and for too long: then everything copping a whiplashing from Cyclone Gabrielle. Our February meeting will be an opportunity to get together and talk about the challenges - all put into perspective considering the plight of many around the country whose lives have been so severely impacted by this major event.

We have very much appreciated offers from a number of locals for the opportunity for the club to view their gardens at a later stage. Our usual local garden ramble planned for February has been postponed on account of storm damage and we wish those people well in their work to restore their gardens. Our president, Kirsten, has a theory about gardeners being a resilient lot and she says that things repaired in the garden can end up even better than before!

Last November, the club visited two gardens in Ward Road, Matakana: the beautiful property of Robyn and Simon Barclay with its large trees, lakes and perennial garden beds - the setting for the annual Matakana Opera Picnic http://www.aucklandoperastudio.co.nz and the fascinating studios and gardens of glass artist and ceramicist, Vicki Fannin, and painter/designer,

Mike Petre, and their restored farmhouse, wetland and paddock with folly. Vicki sells her dahlias and her vases to go with them from her studio, Frolic Ceramics.

The appalling weather in December on the day of our proposed Christmas picnic at the Fishers' property on Omaha Flats Road caused us to make hasty plans to have it in the hall instead. Committee members arrived early armed with greenery from our gardens and we set up and decorated tables, transforming the hall in no time at all into a lovely Christmas picnic venue.

Leigh and Richard Fisher were our guests and Richard gave us a delightful talk about the establishment and development of their property and its gardens. He also generously issued an invitation for us to come to his property on two days the following week. Many of us were able to take up his offer and he treated us to a tour of their wonderful property - including the extensive dahlia and lily gardens and the cricket pitch (which he is keen for local people to make use of) with its cute little, architectural award-winning, cricket pavilion.

If you are interested in joining the garden club and/or sharing your garden, we'd love to hear from you. Email: ptwellsgarden@gmail.com

Marion Ransom