We are now well into this final year before Waimarie once again operates on the River - and it is already a busy year on all fronts.
In January we had 1180 visitors to the Riverboat Centre, the highest monthly tally on record except for the Grand Opening month of February 1996, and the pace in the museum has been maintained since. Many thanks to all museum volunteers for their dedication and good service to our visitors, an increasing number of whom are from overseas.
The temporary exhibition Postcards of the Whanganui River has proved popluar and museum committee members are currently working on new thematic exhibitions. The Manawatu Wanganui Regional Council's photo exhibition upstairs was also very successful and this year the Regional Council's programme of educationl exhibitions and activities will start, so we expect to be particularly busy with an increase in the number of school visits to the Riverboat Centre.
Waimarie will feature this year in two short films produced by TVNZ for the Lotteries Commission for its Winning Kiwis series. These films will be shown on the Lotto programme, so look out for them. As we hasten towards operational mode on the River, national promotion like this is great for the project.
In December 1998 the Trust Bank Wanganui Copmmunity Trust very generously donated another $300,000 to Project Waimarie; Powerco Community Trust also donated another $28,500 towards the boiler, bringing its total contribution to almost $99,000. We have recently submitted a funding application to the Lottery Grants Board and are working hard to obtain