"Running a place like this is not hard hours but it's long hours. I'm tired," he says.
The couple have made the Hukerenui into one of the most successful of Northland's old hotels in nine years of ownership, capitalising on the State Highway 1 location, strong community support and a 1.21ha site that allows plenty of space for parking.
Bob McGregor did a brilliant bit of strategising when he gave land next door to the hotel for the new Jack Morgan Museum, organised the building and set up the displays. Growing numbers of tourists travelling in buses, campervans and caravans now lunch at the pub after visiting the museum. There's talk of expanding the museum building and there's plenty of room to do so.
Cyclists call in for toasted sandwiches and coffee. There's four rooms with ablution block at the back of the hotel used by truckies and back-packers.
The hotel opens at noon but Bob McGregor says if he were younger and staying on he would get into breakfasts without a doubt.
Just up the road, Cayman Island-based expat Mac Imrie is selling the land and buildings of the 114-year-old Towai Hotel for an undisclosed price, while the business remains with lessees Sam Selak and Chaz Thomas. Imrie bought the property, and friend Evan Davies bought the business about five years ago, opening with high hopes after a $200,000 renovation/restoration that cost more and took longer than they had expected - an occupational hazard with historic hotels.
The partners worked with the NZ Historic Places Trust to get the look right, exposing original kauri ceilings and reinstalling sash windows on the road frontage. They recarpeted and put in a new dining room and commercial kitchen. The community thronged the opening where Davies said they were aiming to create a family-friendly community/tourism/wedding destination (there's a historic church across the road) but recession dented the dream badly. Davies got out first, selling the business two years ago.
The Auckland businessman who owns the big Dargaville Central Hotel is asking about $500,000 for the complex that stands grandly on a corner site near the Northern Wairoa river, grander outside than in these days. A buyer will get a large building with floor area of 697 sq metres on a 2064sq m site, with 13 accommodation units, commercial kitchen poker machines, and on-site manager accommodation. Marketer Roger Seavill of Colliers International says it needs "hands-on creativity".
Melba Amos, owner of the Hikurangi Hotel, has seen three contracts for selling the business fall over since she put the business on the market in 2008, after the death of her husband Geoff. The hotel sees plenty of action - there are live bands every Friday, pool tournaments and the successful Hikurangi Anglers Club - but she says there are several aspects which could be developed, for a start reopening the bistro and six unused bedrooms upstairs.
She loves it that people come in and say, "what a nice feel this building has" and says she could have sold the business several times over if the land and buildings had been part of the package. These are owned by Auckland investor Hashid Singh. Mrs Amos has dropped her original asking price of $340,000 by $90,000.
The 137-year-old Masonic Hotel at Rawene, owned and operated by Grant Hyland since 2008, and with unrestricted views over the Hokianga harbour, is on the market for $595,000.
He says the Masonic has huge potential, but its future will have to be very different from its colonial heyday.
Businesses like the Masonic had to offer good coffee and cafe food, good accommodation and tourism packages. "We've been on the point of selling several times over the past 18 months so we've held back on doing new things but if we were staying we would certainly get into the tourism side," he says.
He says it's a battle to run any country pub, historic or not, these days with liquor now available from supermarkets cheaper than the hotels can buy it from their suppliers.
"When I first got into the hotel trade every hotel was pumping, often heaving with wall-to-wall people. Those days are gone forever. It's a case of diversify or die for country pubs."
