Multi-purpose block opened

HORIZONS Regional Council Chairman, Garry Murfitt, wielded some hedge clippers to cut the cake at the recent opening of the new multi-purpose building at Totara Reserve Regional Park in the Pohangina Valley.

The designer-built block on the Camp Rangi Woods side of the park incorporates an office-information centre as well as toilet and shower units and is expected to be in constant use during the upcoming Christmas-New Year camping season.
Representatives from Horizons, Manawatu District Council, Department of Conservation, Camp Rangi Woods and the Eastern and Central Community Trust attended the opening as well as a number of local residents.

The centre has been designed to provide improved facilities for campers and to cater for the increased crowd numbers expected during a predicted hot 2008-09 summer.
A newly-established playground for younger children near the building was also opened and special presentations made to the builder, Noel Leins, and bushwalk clearance volunteers, Neal Gilchrist and Mick Pettifar, who have had loop tracks in the park named after them.

* Sales of Pohangina Valley Estate’s newly-launched red wine, Totara Reserve, are going well and $500 has already been raised for a totara planting programme at the park.

Manawatu’s sole vineyard joined forces with Manawatu District and Horizons Regional Councils in a unique community initiative to donate $1 towards the programme for every bottle sold from its first 1000-bottle vintage.

Orders from as far afield as Tauranga have been received for the Beaujolais-style red, with 500 bottles already sold within the first month of release.