Customer Feedback Award for Accommodation of the Year

This is a time of year when I really struggle to discipline myself to write.

As I sit here in my office and look outside, the garden with a myriad of brightly coloured flowers and the lush green of the lawn are glowing in beautiful spring sunshine. However, the draw outside is not just about lovely spring days. Rather there are so many outside jobs to be completed before the main visitor season truly starts.

In the last few days we have upgraded our hot water system in the main lodge, we have made a major start on planting out the organic vegetable garden which provides the Lodge with much of its summer produce needs, we have fixed fences damaged by last month’s almost forgotten weather event, 24 new laying hens are arriving at the end of the week meaning their accommodation needs to be ready, and so the list of projects and maintenance goes on. There is definitely no time for boredom.

One highlight of the last few days was attending the annual Kiwi Experience Greenfest. An annual party that celebrates the relationship that many operators and providers have with what is New Zealand’s leading transport network for young travellers.

River Valley’s relationship with Kiwi Experience started in 1995, before many of the current coach travellers were born. It is a relationship that underpins much of what we are able to accomplish here in the back blocks of Taihape.

For a business relationship to last this long we would like to think that we must be doing something right, and so it would appear.

We were really pleased to receive one of four awards that operators and providers were presented with during the evening.

In our case, we were rapt to receive the Customer Feedback Award for Accommodation of the Year. What made this particular award so special was that it was entirely based on feedback from people who had visited River Valley. As explained to me, what customers were really rating was the entirety of the River Valley experience.

We were in some good company with other award recipients.

AJ Hackett Bungy received the Customer Feedback Award for Activity of the Year

Lake Mahinapua Hotel received the Driver Feedback Award for Accommodation of the Year

Tamaki Tours received the Driver Feedback Award for Activity of the Year

Now I’m off the waterblast a mobile hen house and get it ready for those new hens. There is nothing quite like the taste of our own Free Range eggs.

Brian Megaw