Clubrooms and club gear

Clubrooms

The Clubrooms (find us here) are the focal point of the club – they give us somewhere to store our boats, and get changed and showered, they act as a start and finish place for some of our races, and as a gathering point for our training sessions.  They also have a gym and a pair of kayak ergs for extra training (particularly when the weather is filthy outside), a kitchen and a large meeting room for meetings and functions, with a TV and video for technique analysis.  There’s a bike rack for the mad rash fools (and there are plenty of us) who wish to cycle to and from their kayak sessions.

The new building was completed to the point we could start using it in April 2003 and was officially opened on the 7th of September 2003 by the Christchurch mayor, Garry Moore.  The Clubrooms are the result of a huge fundraising effort and a lot of hard work and time from a lot of members, and extra effort from a Gang of Four special members – Terry Duff (architect), Graham Allan (project co-ordinator), John Corney and Lloyd Bathurst – who drove the project at great risk to their marriages.  There’s still a lot to be done on the building, and money to be spent, if you think you can help out with specific things or funding, please see the Wishlist.

Plans are afoot (June 2009) to extend the kayak storage area, which should more than double the available space.

Club boats and paddlesThree quarters of our fleet of new K1's being road tested

The club has a selection of kayaks for members to use, from the mild to the outrageous, a range of wing paddles, buoyancy aids, and a trailer set up for carrying kayaks.  Most are freely available for paddling on the Avon from the Clubrooms, first in first served, and all are available for races.  However, there are some constraints:

1.  Members only.  All users must be current members of the Arawa Canoe Club.  Club members have put in the effort and money to buy and maintain the boats, it’s only fair that they get to use them.

2.  Some of the kayaks need committee approval before you can use them.  They are special boats for one reason or another, and we don’t want them kicked around needlessly.  If you really need to use one, contact the Premises & Equipment Officer, who will get confirmation from another committee member, and give you clearance (if appropriate).

3.  Deep water only.  This is so the bottoms don’t get torn out of the kayaks over shallows and rocks – no matter how good a paddler you are, it will happen.

4.  Please don’t take any beginner boats out on Wednesdays between 5pm and 5:30pm unless you’re coming with us on the technique training session.  There is a huge demand for those boats then, and we’ve had to turn people away because we don’t have a kayak for them, only to see the boat come in 5 minutes later.

5.  If you plan to take the kayaks somewhere, Arawa need the assurance that you have suitable racks on your vehicle – especially for the Hypernovas – they’re bloody long boats.

6.  A $10 booking fee applies in all cases.  It’s heartbreaking to see a boat left on a rack over a race weekend, when the creature that booked it didn’t want it in the end, and you’ve turned away 2 or 3 people that wanted it for the same race.

7.  The Hypernovas have a maintenance fee which will vary according to the type of race and time that they’ll be away from the Clubrooms (typically $175 per weekend).  They tend to get more of a hammering due to the nature of the races they’re used for, and things get 'lost' from them, like a bilge pump, rear hatch, etc., hence the fee.

8.  Report any damage.  Accidents happen, but if we don’t know about damage to club equipment, we can’t do anything about getting it fixed.  Wear and tear and minor repairs we can live with, but acts of gross stupidity (such as tying the boats down onto roofracks with enormous, boat-crushing strength) will be charged back to the perpetrator.  There may be some negotiation over who pays for how much, but don’t count on it.