Museum Musings

February 2023

The weather!! Well, what can we say that hasn’t already been said?? Here in the Museum the weather is a positive for us - rain means inside activities! This has really shown in our visitor numbers for January - a whopping 1200 through in the month! We have had amazing feedback on the work we have done over the past year with some of our returning visitors noticing the changes we have made.

We are looking forward to commemorating Waitangi Day here at the Museum next week with a public programme for the children. We will have craft activities available for a gold coin donation - ‘Fold a Waka’ and ‘Tohu - Signatures of the Treaty.’ The Tohu activity has the children write their own tohu with a feather quill and ink just like they did in 1840. Check out the events that are on our Facebook page for more details.

We want to thank the community for keeping an eye out on the beach for pieces of the HMS Buffalo shipwreck that may have washed ashore. We have had several pieces of timber and copper brought into the Museum so we can record them and add to our collection. The HMS Buffalo Re-examination Project team are looking at recording the GPS positions of the pieces so we can track the movement of wreckage in the bay. This all adds to the story of the wreck.

Later in the month the Museum and the HMS Buffalo Re-examination Project are co-hosting a workshop with Dr Andy Viduka for GIRT - Gathering Information via Recreational and Technical (GIRT) Scientific Divers. It’s a citizen science project for people who want to dive with a purpose and who are passionate about shipwrecks and other underwater cultural heritage. If you want to know more pop in and have a chat or head to our the HMS Buffalo Re-examination Project facebook page for more information.

And, as always, if you have been thinking about volunteering in the community please pop in and see us. We have a few spaces available and some really exciting new projects coming up this year that I am sure you would love to be a part of. We look forward to seeing.

Keep an eye on our social media – Facebook and Instagram. We are always posting on what we are up too in the Museum.

See you all soon

Becs

Caption: Two pieces of timber from the Buffalo. They recently washed ashore and were brought to the Museum.