Forests and mountainbiking fit together perfectly and Waiariki's Jeremy Christmas is planning to give Rugby World Cup business visitors a taste of both.
"I am a keen cyclist myself and it is very much a part of iconic Rotorua. We have this stunning forest and this is a great opportunity to
showcase this for our visitors."
As the director of Waiariki Institute of Technology's School of Forestry and Primary Industries, Christmas is also involved in Rotorua forests from a logging and timber perspective. He will combine a mountainbike tour of Whakarewarewa Forest with refreshments at the institute and a campus tour.
"The idea of the Business Club is to match hosts and activities with the appropriate people coming into New Zealand. This is a good match."
He said most forestry regions around the world now had strong mountainbiking communities.
He expected a good number of forestry people visiting would be keen to experience one of the first multipurpose forests. Two people had already signed up for the event, but he had no idea how much interest it would generate.
"We will wait and see what the response is. If this is too high, we can either target people a bit more to reduce numbers or I'm sure some of our keen young cyclists from Waiariki's sports academy could join us and we could split the group."
He knows a lot of forestry people will be coming to New Zealand during the Rugby World Cup and did not hesitate about getting involved in business hosting.
"It's just about being a good Kiwi host, isn't it?"
