She might be a little rough around the edges, but for a 132-year-old she's in pretty good shape.
Kawakawa's Star Hotel celebrated its 132nd birthday last Saturday, the same day the Bay of Islands Railway Trust celebrated winning the supreme prize in the TrustPower National Community Awards.
Publican Frank Gardiner said it
was fitting the pub and the railway celebrated on the same day, as they were the two oldest surviving institutions in the town.
Mr Gardiner and his wife, Eleanor, were invited up from Timaru by the pub's Auckland owner in a bid to make the hotel once again a focal point of the community.
He established the pub's birthday after unearthing a news clipping from April 19, 1879, about the pub's opening.
The milestone was celebrated with a hangi for 400 people, the United Kawakawa Rugby Club's prizegiving and a country and western club knees-up.
Mr Gardiner said plans for improving the historic pub included revamping the garden bar and some improvements inside, but nothing ostentatious. "That would be sacrilege," he said.
