Gundry's Grumbles with Simon Gundry

Looking forward to summer…

It’s lovely to see the winter almost gone, and daylight savings now in full swing. It certainly was a September to be remembered, one that I don’t think any New Zealander will forget.

I read last month there is going to be a Reunion of Takapuna Grammar School pupils who attended the school from 1960 until 1969. I was part of that crowd, and looking back what an unbelievable decade that was – the 60’s. I think they call us the baby boomers, born in the late 40’s and early 50’s. I started Grammar school in 1965 along with a number of other fresh faced callow youths of the area. My parents by then had moved to Fraser Road and bought an old state house, the first home they ever owned. It was there I met Walter Gill, who has been my business partner for the last 40 years – we used to walk to school together every day.

The 1960’s – what a remarkable decade in the world’s history we witnessed. The President of the USA at the start of that decade was Eisenhower, and then Kennedy took over in 1961 and was faced with the Cuban missile crisis which saw the world on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Then Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas in 1963. Everyone remembers where they were that day when the news broke. Then the Vietnam War, the first war we ever saw on television during the evening news, if you were lucky enough to have a TV at that stage. The demise of Nixon, and “Watergate” became a word to remember. The music that changed our world, the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Beach Boys, Donovan, Bob Dylan, and Hollies. Of course there were our own New Zealand bands including Larry’s Rebels. The space race that was in full swing throughout that decade starting with the first man in space in 1961 and ending with the first man on the moon in 1969. Oh, how the world changed forever during that decade.

I left school in 1969 not having a clue what career path to take, but I suppose it turned out okay. Steve Tindall left Takapuna Grammar at the same time, wanting to be a shop keeper, and that seems to have turned out okay too.

Living in Fraser Road, the closest beach is Narrow Neck Beach. What a farcical situation I see happening there at present, with the Wakatere Boating Club. This Club was formed in 1926 by a group of enthusiastic sailing locals. The Club has been home to some great sailing families, the Brooke and the Salthouse families, Holmes, Robertsons, Armstrongs, Chapmans to name just a few. The fathers sailed there and then taught their children to sail there. What a wonderful family Club.

John Brooke drew the lines of the first famous Wakatere boat known as the Wakatere, a 15 or 16 footer. He also drew the lines of the Frostbite and the Sabot and in the mid 60’s the wonderful Sunburst class. Generations of children have learned to sail in these boats. The first clubhouse was just basically an old house on the beach. The early members built a wooden ramp, probably from borrowed timber from nearby construction sites or such. This was to enable the safe passage of trailered boats from the Clubrooms down onto the beach. In those days the road ran between the beach and the Clubrooms, this was changed in the early 70’s. Now the road goes behind the Clubrooms to make the place a lot safer for the junior members of the Club.

Recently a storm picked up and moved the wooden ramp way, leaving it completely unusable. The members now have to use the concrete slipway on the eastern end of the beach to launch and retrieve their sailboats.

Now the Wakatere Boating Club must smother themselves in bureaucratic red tape to enable them to repair the ramp. The ARC and the North Shore City Council have both had meetings with the Wakatere Boating Club in September, and they have deemed the ramp to be an illegal existing structure. Now, the wheels seem to be set in motion to get a coastal consent for the existing structure, or a replacement consent, in order to carry out repairs. How stupid and time consuming this is for the Club, not to mention the vast expense for all the engineers and geotech engineers, consultants etc. The Club is set to host the National Optimist Championships at Easter 2011. There will be 350 boats at this contest including over 50 from overseas. This will be the largest single class Regatta ever held in New Zealand, and the Club must have an operable, safe slipway for this event.

The Council officers have been quoted as saying that the concrete slipway at the eastern end of the beach would be suitable for boat launching and retrieval. I say this is absolutely unsafe, as it is also a public launching area where large 4-wheel drive vehicles back down to pick up their craft. Tired kids and reversing vehicles with trailers are not a good mix in the late afternoon. I believe it to be so unsafe that no-one in their right mind would even consider this as an option. This slipway must be rebuilt immediately, to a good specification, to enable the Wakatere Boating Club to carry on as they have been for the next generation, and those to come. Sailing on the North Shore is part of our make up. Could we just get this bureaucratic crap out of our lives and get on with matters that do deserve urgency. What a ridiculous situation.

Oh, I almost forgot the Reunion for the Takapuna Grammar School pupils, if you are part of this era and would like to attend please email j.birkett@takapuna.school.nz

Another thing I’m sick of is the proliferation of parking wardens in Devonport, but I’ll have to get on to that another time as that warrants a full frontal attack. Also, have you noticed how many more barriers have been put in place on the stretch of road between Hauraki and Esmonde Roads, I must do a count up and see how much that is costing us all.

Anyway, have a great Labour weekend.