Westpac—1 September 2022

We were delighted to welcome executives from the financial risk management department at Westpac to start off the spring maintenance season.

The group arrived first thing in the morning and included Cam, John, Joy, Matt, May, Michael, Rico, Ryan and Samuel.  Also joining us for the day was our good friend and regular volunteer Alan.

All of the Westpac team were new to CUE Haven so we spent some time getting acquainted over morning tea and then Mahrukh gave an overview of the project and described the current activities and future plans.

Thomas then gave a safety briefing and outlined the work planned for the day.

Because we haven’t had volunteers out to CUE Haven for several months, the primary plan for the day was to work on cleaning up the walking tracks after the winter wind and rain. A couple of heavy rainstorms had caused some washout and erosion on the tracks and there were also lots of branches down on the tracks.

We drove up to the work site and went to work.  Because the plan was to simply work our way down the track making improvements as we went, we worked as a single team, tackling different tasks as we moved down the track.

The biggest challenges were fixing the washouts as the team had to study the situation to determine where and how the water had come down the track. Repairing the track required a lot of digging and clearing drains.

The team worked their way along the track repairing the ruts and channels caused by the heavy rains.

The team also encountered vegetation that had grown over the track that had to be cut back.

Some of the vegetation couldn’t be trimmed—a big old kanuka tree had fallen along the track and the team cut it into smaller bits and hauled it away.

The team continued to get a good workout as they cleared the many fallen branches and leaves along the way.

The last task was to put down a layer of gravel on the repaired track sections to make the track easy for visitors to use in all weather.

We loaded up buckets of gravel.

We then drove as close to the site as we could and from there the buckets were carried to the track where they were dumped and the gravel raked in.

The empty buckets were taken back up and refilled.

By lunchtime the team had upgraded and totally transformed over half a kilometer long section of track.

The team worked really hard and accomplished a huge amount of work, exceeding our expectations for the day.  They made major improvements to the track and should be very proud of their efforts.  This is how the track looks now!

What a fantastic improvement!!!

Once we were finished, the team brought down all the gear, cleaned up and had a relaxing lunch.

We really enjoyed the day —it was great seeing the collegiality and teamwork. And everyone showed a lot of creativity and energy in coming up with solutions to the track challenges.

Many thanks to Rico for organising the volunteer day. And a big thank you to Alan for coming out once again to help. It was great having you join the Westpac team.  

Huge thanks to everyone who came out today!  We very much appreciate your hard work and amazing contribution to CUE Haven. We hope you enjoyed the day as much as we did and we very much look forward to having you out again for another fun and productive volunteer day.

And we also look forward to having you out with your friends and family for a leisurely visit soon to explore more of your community native forest reserve.

Thank You!! Thank You!!