Bank of New Zealand – Highbrook Business Banking–September 2020

BNZ is one of New Zealand’s largest banks and they have a strong commitment to community service.  We were very happy when one of our regular volunteers, Kelly, approached us about having her new colleagues from BNZ Highbrook Business Banking team spend a day at CUE Haven helping out.

The team arrived bright and early and included Amanda, Andrew, Bianca, Hamish, Jane and Lu-Yen

Andrew had volunteered at CUE Haven before, but the rest of the team was new to CUE Haven, so Mahrukh spent some time explaining the history and philosophy of CUE Haven and gave a description of the project and plans for the future.  And Thomas gave a description of the work planned for the day and a safety briefing.

The plan for the day was to work on a variety of improvements to an old section of walking track.  We wanted to widen and level the track and install some side boards to improve the appearance.  The track runs along a sloping section of ground and curves at almost a right angle at one point.

Once in the field, we carried all the gear down to the work site and went to work.

We took a quick tour of the track section so the team could plan their work.

Using string lines, they planned the route for the track and laid out the timber.

The next task was digging out channels for the side boards.

Some of the boards had to be cut to size.

The boards were then secured in place with pegs and nails.

The team joined up their new section to an older section of track.

And then continued working down the track.

The hardworking team made so much progress, we had to go down and get more timber!!

The team wanted to completely finish off their section of track by laying down a layer of gravel to make the track fit for all weather use.  Part of the team went down to fill up buckets with gravel.

We drove up as close to the work site as possible and then carried the buckets down to the track.

The gravel was dumped on the track.

And raked smooth.

The team accomplished an amazing amount of work in a short time and they should be very proud of their efforts.

This is how the track looked at the start of the day.

And this is how it looks now!

What an amazing difference!!!

Our many thanks to Kelly, who unfortunately couldn’t join us, for organizing a very successful and productive volunteer day. Kelly we look forward to having you back again soon.

And a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone for all their hard work and efforts today. You have all made a major contribution to CUE Haven and your efforts will be greatly appreciated by visitors as they comfortably walk the tracks to explore the growing native forest.

We thoroughly enjoyed working with you all and we hope that you will come back to CUE Haven soon to explore more of your community reserve with your family and friends. And back again next year for another productive volunteer day!

Thank you!! Thank you!!