We broke a long sequence of bad luck with weather for club gatherings on Sunday, with blue sky, sunshine and barely a breath of wind throughout the morning at Tahunanui Beach.
The day began with a moment of sadness as we remembered our friend Leanne O’Neil. When we ran one of our doubles and singles outings a couple of years ago Leanne was front and centre of trying out a new experience so she would have been happy that so many people got to do the same today.
After a brief get together join the beach we did what the club does best : broke up into smaller groups with everyone looking after and helping everyone else. We also found a couple of new paddlers wandering the beach who had a go and declared themselves hooked!
There were lots of learnings for everyone ( I learnt that women often need a different method of getting back in to the Waka than men) but mainly just lots of fun, with just about everyone achieving the aim of falling in a lot.
As so often the real hard work was done unnoticed, as the morning wouldn’t have been as much fun without the doubles and singles that came from the marina and back so big shout out to Sean, Kate, Simone, Jody, Suzy and Robyn who delivered and returned them.
We get to do it all again next Saturday 8th at 09.00 when we should also have a six down the beach for a bit of ama flying and huli fun. We can build a bit on what we did this weekend and if anyone else wants to turn up you are more than welcome. Fingers crossed for similar weather and a little bump on the bar.
Its never too early or too late to start paddling waka ama
We always welcome new members to the Maitahi Outrigger Canoe Club.
We have social and racing waka ama crews catering for a wide variety of ages and abilities.