from the AGM
This year was like a river...
A year of adventure, surfs, and a lot of rocks
The approach to the river itself was a challenge, and the new exec had plenty to deal with before the year had even started: finding a new pool, the battle of the polo boats, cyclone Gabrielle and of course the horse girls who stole our campspot :(
But we dove right in and in no time we were sending it down the river. Thanks to our multitalented Fulljames officer Lydia, we brought around 80 paddlers on the iconic Nga Awa Purua (Fulljames) wave. And thanks everyone for making it an epic 21st for me, despite me falling asleep at 11pm.
Our pool officers found themselves in a hole, having been kicked out from our previous location. We had to adjust to a new pool and the influx of international students. However our two ass. instructors Ben and Dion handled this with grace and ended up surfing that hole, managing a consistent turnout at pool and getting plenty of rolling on the menu.
The calmer little eddies we’ve found throughout the year have given many of us the opportunity to form new friendships and foster that iconic AUCC community. Since joining AUCC in 2021, this has been super important to me and it’s really exciting to see how the club supports all of its new members both on river and off river.
Soon we’re back into the flow with two beginners trips to Kawerau. I used to be one of maybe a dozen beginners, but now we’ve had dozens of beginners come along to these trips and have a rad time. Beginner’s trips still seem cursed in terms of getting food ratios right, so there’s a challenge to the next trip organizers!
Many of our literal rocks, intentional or not, were hit on our upskilling trips. Upskilling and consolidating the skills of our up and coming seconders, in my opinion, has been a major success this year. We’ve had two official upskilling trips which have given keen paddlers the opportunity to focus on improving their paddling. This is already paying off, seeing seconders help out at pool trainings and giving beginners tips on trips. I am now making a statement to say that I’m no longer scared of Tarawera.
Floating down the river, we found a pot of gold!! (bad metaphor) but thanks to the grant funding Wen-Jie and Juliet acquired, we now have a brand new, very fast, red Axiom 8.5 as well as a bunch of new, unholy spray skirts which have already been christened on river.
Considering that many of our instructors have moved out of Auckland, AUCC has still managed to bring a huge number of people on the awa. Thank you so much to our instructors, especially our Auckland based ones, for leading your little ducklings down the river.
To the incoming exec team: Change is a constant which I've learnt after two years in exec. You just gotta learn to ride the wave. Have fun, this is an awesome club, so take pride in contributing to its running. Discord for comms is cool, keep the memes going and get stuff done.
To the exec team of 2023: you guys have been fantastic, we've had a lot of changes this year and some of us were young and fresh and still beginner paddlers but the club is still very much alive and afloat and I'll cheers to that. Thanks for turning up to meetings and making cool stuff happen and I’ll see you all on the river a bunch more!
Over and out
Frances Chow
AUCC President 2022/23
