RUGBY - Bricks to boost Kaeo club back to its best

Kaeo Rugby Club is getting a whole lot of bricks thrown at it this week.
Whangarei bricklayers are heading to Kaeo tomorrow to lay 2500 bricks on top of the foundations, ready for the clubrooms to be lowered from its stilts.
The club has had a rough couple of years, with floods twice wrecking the clubrooms. After the second flood, members resolved to raise the clubrooms by two metres.
The Kaeo community and people from all over the country have come together in support of the club, "sponsoring" bricks for the rebuild at $5 each.
A Whangarei bricklayer and member of the Northland Masonry Trades Association, Geoff Nieuwelaar, said he was looking forward to making a difference for Kaeo by laying the bricks this week.
"When we saw what had happened to them up here we wanted to lend a hand," he said.
"So we rang up Robbie (the club captain) and said we'll come up if he shouts us lunch and a few beers afterwards."
Mr Nieuwelaar said the 10 or so bricklayers had been lent a van by the Northland Rugby Union and should have most of the work - laying bricks donated by Stevensons - done in a day.
Club captain Robbie Ball said things were looking up for the club after two hard years.
"This year has actually been worse than last year," he said.
"We were just about to re-open after repairs from the first flood when we got hit by floods again."
Easter Weekend is set down for the club's big re-reopening, just in time for the 2009 rugby season.
The Kaeo club has spent two years without a clubhouse, which has taken a toll on the team which otherwise did well in the Bay of Islands rugby competition.
"This year's been a real struggle to keep the club operating," Mr Ball said.
"After our home games, we'd go back to the Marlin Hotel in Whangaroa, where the staff there were really good about putting on a spread - but it's not the same as being in your own space."
Windy weather this week did nothing to ease Mr Ball's nerves, as the clubrooms balanced on stilts above the foundations.
"If we have 100-mile-an-hour winds we might not even have a clubhouse," he said.