Festival 2022 Bulletin #5

Hello everyone,

While the world sits in turmoil and unrest with COVID-19, we in NZ are approaching the opening date for registrations for the 2022 IBCPC festival. We understand that a small number of you are uncertain about the timing of registering your teams and that is perfectly okay as there is no rush, whilst others are straining to register at the first opportunity on 1st July.

At this stage we have no reason to postpone or cancel. We are closely watching what is happening globally and when we see organisations such as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) following every avenue they can to bring the Olympics to Tokyo in 2021, it provides great hope that the world will have calmed down by then.

The festival accountants have advised that due to the global volatility of currencies caused by COVID-19, that the payment of fees is to be in New Zealand dollars only.

The registration fee per participant remains at the stated NZ$580 with the deposit payable on registration now being NZ$230. New and updated timelines to accommodate the earlier postponements, registration closure and any potential postponement/cancelation are below:

1. 1st July 2020 (10am NZ time) Registration opens for full teams of 22-26, deposit NZ$230 per registrant payable

2. 31st July 2020 Successful early bird registrants notified

3. 1st August 2020 (10am NZ time) Registration opens for individual participants/part teams, children and supporters, NZ$230 per registrant payable

4. 31st May 2021 (10am NZ time) Registration closes, balance of fees payable

5. Cancelation due to COVID-19 prior to 31st May 2021. Refund of fees less costs incurred. Approx $10 per paddler in costs.

6. Cancelation due to COVID-19 after 31st May 2021, prior to 30th September 2021. Refund of fees less costs incurred. Approx $20 per paddler in costs.

7. 1st October 2021 Postponement/cancelation announcement date

8. 27th March-2nd April 2023. New festival date if postponed.

We are incredibly grateful to Meri Gibson for bringing us all together to organise this festival for you. We had planned to make ourselves known earlier, but the COVID-19 lockdown and restrictions that brought, made us rethink our timing and timelines. We know that Meri will be very pleased to no longer be the email link on the festival info address and is looking forward to getting some of her life back. We thank her enormously for all she has done to bring us this far.

The 2022 festival Organising Committee (OC) will be progressively rolling out profile bio’s of the people involved on the OC. The OC members are:

Chair: Deb Stevenson

Secretary: Brooke Hargreaves

Communications: Annelies Basten

Administration: Jane Robins

Volunteers: Colleen Harris

Health & Safety: Andrew Watson

Medical: Evan Roper

Officials: Noel Anderton

Technical: Peter Mitchell & Caleb Te Kahu

In addition to those listed above there will be one representative from every breast-cancer team in the country as part of the OC liaison group.

Yours in paddling,

Deb and the OC