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The Kowhai Festival committee has decided to cancel the main festival events this year and postpone others in the wake of the uncertainty around Covid-19 lockdown restrictions.
The cancelled events are Summer Vibes – formerly due to take place on Saturday, November 20 – and Family Day on November 21.
The events were due to include stalls, a music stage, rides and amusements around Warkworth’s wharf area and Baxter Street.
Festival committee acting chair Philip Tyler says to run both events would have required Auckland to be at Alert
Level 1, which now appears unlikely. The suggestion that people might require vaccine passports to attend the event also added to the uncertainty.
“We had to make the call to cancel for a bunch of reasons – mainly around supporting vendors, who will be providing food and alcohol, and allowing them time to make alternative arrangements if they wanted to,” he says.
Philip says the festival outdoor movie night will no longer be on October 30 but may run in late November or early December – possibly as a drive-in event.
The Great Debate scheduled for November 27 is postponed until February.
Philip says the festival committee is extremely disappointed to have to cancel the main festival events two years running.
“But we are pleased we can now focus on making next year’s festival bigger and better. We will be doing everything we possibly can to have a really good year next year. Hopefully, most people will be vaccinated by then,” he says.
