Summer crowd enjoys gala day

Attended by the masses enjoying a smorgasbord of over 200 art, craft and cuisine stalls, musical entertainment, carnival rides, sightseeing trips and fairground atmosphere, Mangawhai’s Summer Gala remains one of the area’s largest annual ‘must see’ attractions.

With numbers of holidaymakers, locals and visitors tallying between 6500-7000 every year at the Mangawhai Domain on January 2, the Gala continues to be the facility’s major fundraiser, raising ‘an excellent result’ of around $30, 000 for ongoing maintenance such as repairing the sports pavilion and further draining of the sports field.

The event involves over 100 volunteers and is supported by the local business community.

A number of stallholders have already booked in for the 2021 event, and Gala coordinator Robert de Koning says generally they were quite satisfied.

“Which is important as stall holder quality is important for servicing the visiting public,” he says. “We were short of certain volunteers affecting a few tasks this year, but overall I think the whole event went really well.”

An event the scale of the Domain Summer Gala can only be prepared and realised with the support of a huge amount of dedicated and committed volunteers and sponsors, and the Gala committee would like to express their gratitude to everyone involved.

n WORDS & PHOTOS BY JULIA WADE
 

Local ukulele band Totally Uked entertained the crowds with a variety of sing-a-long songs and melodies.

The superb lifelikeness of a few dog sculptures appeared to cause some confusion for this four-legged gala-goer

Kerikeri’s ‘Campbell Copters’ flights gave thrill-seekers a birds-eye view of the gala as well as Mangawhai’s stunning coastline.