Windfall from Georgia

They may have left town, but the Georgian rugby team have left behind a financial windfall for their Masterton hotel.

The Georgian rugby players and staff stayed at the Copthorne Solway Park for seven nights last week while they used Masterton as their training base ahead of last night's Pool B clash against Romania in Palmerston North.

They headed over the Tararuas on Monday morning, after a week of wowing Wairarapa people with their traditional costume and general approachability.

Copthorne general manager Jerry Crump said the players, coupled with other World Cup visitors, led to a "near record" week for the hotel. "It wasn't an overall record but it was probably the biggest week we've had in three or four years.

"Financially it was hugely beneficial to us and that spills over through our staff spending in the community."

Copthorne took over the operation at Solway 14 years ago, with Mr Crump coming on board five years ago. He said visitors from South Africa, Canada and Scotland had also stayed, choosing to travel to over the Rimutaka Hill to Wellington to attend games. "Whereas those numbers aren't huge they're definitely up on what we normally do."

- Meanwhile the latest electronic spending figures from Paymark show a small decrease in Wairarapa spending during the World Cup.

A total of $6,196,000 was spent in Wairarapa last week, down 0.8 per cent from the previous year's figure of $6,243,000. However, the number of electronic transactions was up 4.2 per cent, from 134,000 transactions last year to 140,000 last week.

Nationally foreign card spending continued to climb last week, up 37 per cent on last year.