Boats head for Creek

By ROBIN BAILEY

The Mystery Creek exhibition venue near Hamilton has over many years established an international reputation as the place to buy and sell the best the world has to offer in things agricultural.

Now it is going aquatic. The National Boat Show is moving to the riverside site for the first time for a sell-out show from Thursday, August 29 to Sunday, September 1.

Centrepiece of the event will be the big, 6000sqm Mystery Creek Pavilion. This will be surrounded by marquees and clearspan exhibition buildings that will house trailer boats of all shapes and sizes and a complete range of marine equipment, products and services.

Fronting the main pavilion will be two of the Team New Zealand Etchells training yachts, and suspended from the roof an attention-grabber in the form of nine aluminium dinghies.

Boating Industries Association executive director Peter Busfield says the move to Mystery Creek will be great for the boatbuilding companies in the area. It will also be great for the public drawn from the huge catchment area throughout the central North Island, he says.

Chairman Doug Baldwin sees the move from Hamilton to the specialist exhibition space as benefiting both exhibitors and patrons.

"The move means we can support our exhibitors through better infrastructure and professional management. And for patrons it means we can provide a better entertainment experience," he says.

Each day veteran fishing guru Bill Hohepa will be demonstrating how best to prepare hooks, create simple lures and understand the secrets of the Maori fishing calendar. He will also be revealing some culinary secrets.

There are also daily fashion shows that include wet-weather gear, diving and swimwear and specialist multi-sport clothing.

For entertainment from left field there is the Cambridge v Waikato international university rowing challenge on Saturday, August 31. Teams of elite international rowers will go head-to-head indoors over 1000m on rowing machines. The event is a prelude to the first university race on the Waikato River the next day.

Challenge organiser Leigh Townsend says having the two teams both at the show and on the river next day is a great opportunity to promote the sport in the nation's rowing capital.

"To have an elite team like Cambridge University come to Hamilton is fantastic for the sport," he says.

"With the National Academy of Rowing at Lake Karapiro there is a huge depth of talent here and we need to foster and encourage our upcoming rowers."

Rowers from the Waikato, Cambridge and Waikato University rowing clubs will also compete in the indoor series.

One of the bigger boats at the show will be a 34-foot Wavecrusher from Warkworth that weighs 6.5 tonnes and will take more than four hours to get from the Wavecrusher Boats yard to the Hamilton show site.

Marine Haulage manager Bruce Clair says the boat just squeaks in for daylight transport and if all goes well there will be no problems and he won't have to leave the cab at any stage of the trip to Mystery Creek.

Watersport demonstrations will be held on the Waikato River boundary of the exhibition site with jetskis, wakeboarding and Thundercat action from 11am until 2pm on Saturday and Sunday.

Prize for safe skipper

The first prize in the New Zealand Herald safe boating competition will be featured at the National Boat Show.

To win the $60,000 Stabi-Craft 595XR powered by a Yamaha 115hp outboard, entrants need to answer a series of safe skipper questions that will run in the Weekend Herald from October 26.

Until the contest proper begins, the prize rig is acting as a mobile reminder of the need for boat safely.

National Boat Show