01/03/2021
A message from the Wellington Dragon Boating Festival Organisers:
"Kia Ora Paddlers,
As you are now no doubt aware, Wellington has moved into Covid-19 Alert Level 2, meaning that no more than 100 people can attend social gatherings. While we have a plan in place to hold the Festival within Level 2 (see here), we need to prioritise the safety of paddlers, coaches, sweeps, crew, and spectators above our desire to hold the event.
We have made the tough decision this morning to not hold the Festival during Level 2. We are incredibly proud of the event we have created over the past few years, and we are not confident that we can offer teams the same experience if we were to carry on with the restrictions we would have to operate under in Level 2. This creates an opportunity to hold the festival on Sunday 7 March, assuming we move from Level 2 to Level 1 at 6am on this date. However, this also does not seem to be the prudent option, as it places a lot of uncertainty over the Government decision to move back down the Covid-19 Levels later this week. We would rather have conclusive information from Government than be guessing and hoping.
Thus, we are looking at a reschedule of the Festival, and hope to be able to confirm Saturday 13 March for Adults Racing, and Sunday 14 March for Youth/Schools Racing for you all soon. These are our preferred dates but need to get signoff from Wellington City Council, and other waterfront events/users before we can lock them in. With no Festival this weekend the feedback we have had from some teams is that they would like to train in the week leading up to the Festival to be as prepared as they can be to do the race so we are going to cancel all of this week's trainings (Week Beginning Monday 1 March) and replicate this training schedule starting Monday 8 March. If teams would still like to train this week as bonus pieces of training we are offering half-price training of $99 per team. Please let us know if you would like to take any of these sessions and we will do our best to find you a time that works.
We are really gutted to have to be sending out this message. We have worked tirelessly over the last year to plan this event, and a Covid-19 Alert Level change feels very disheartening. However we need to keep at the forefront of our minds that we are so lucky to be in Wellington, New Zealand; and to have paddled for the last 2 months, and be in a position where we are rescheduling the Festival rather than cancelling it. "
