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More than 20,000 people crowded into Warkworth’s Wharf area, Queen Street and Baxter Street for the Kowhai Festival’s Huge Day Out event on October 13.
They enjoyed food, drink and non-stop entertainment – featuring parades, stalls, music, dog shows, woodchopping and more.
For the first time this year, a parade comprising decorated shopping trolleys made its way down Neville Street. They were joined by traditional Chinese dancers from the Falun Dafa Association, the Warkworth Pipe Band and the Guggemusik carnival band.
The Lions Club of Kowhai Coast won best decorated trolley in the community section and Mahurangi Matters won best trolley in the business section.
Other winning trolleys were put together by Warkworth museum, Jade River Ukes, Warkworth library and Trinity Chiropractic.
A draw after the parade saw one lucky festival goer win a $500 travel voucher from helloworld Travel Warkworth, another a $1000 clothing voucher from Stoney Creek.
Kowhai Festival Committee chair Murray Chapman says he is “over the moon” with the way the event played out and believes it is the most successful ever.
“The sun shone and people came out determined to have a good time. I don’t think I’ve seen the wharf area pumping like that in the 10 years I’ve been chairman,” he says.
Murray paid tribute to more than 50 festival ambassadors – volunteers who help with traffic management, shuttle bus driving, answering questions from the public, reuniting lost children and even taking care of stalls should a stallholder have to duck off to the loo.
“Some of the ambassadors have kept coming back every year for years,” he says.
Murray says the switch to holding the event on Sunday rather than Saturday seems to have worked well, giving those who normally work Saturday the chance to join in the fun.
Sergeant Mark Stallworthy, of Warkworth Police, described the event as well run and almost entirely trouble free. He said a couple of young people got a “bit confrontational” at one point and had to be removed, but police had little else to worry about.
