As volunteer week draws to a close, the efforts of locals were celebrated at the Rotorua Lakes Council.
Whakarewarewa Forest, commonly known as Redwoods, was recently awarded the gold standard for mountain biking at an international level.
Greg Brown says it is all down to the tireless support of volunteers. "When the trails were first starting to be developed, there was no funding. It was all on the back of volunteers. It's only really been in relatively recent times that there's been some funding for that - so volunteers have been an enormous part of the success of the trails, for the city."
Several members of the volunteer community were honoured for their part in the forest's success.
Rob Smail was one of them. He's been involved with volunteer work in the forest for many years.
"It's a really good community. The volunteer group is quite a tight group - so it's a lot of fun as well."
Mr Smail says he moved from Auckland to Rotorua specifically to be closer to Whakarewarewa Forest.
He's been involved in the creation and renovation of numerous tracks.
"A lot of it is maintenance, drainage, vegetation clearing - stuff like that. It's everything across the spectrum really."
The Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector, Alfred Ngaro, has been touring the country this week to celebrate the work of volunteers who give back to their local communities.
"In the Bay of Plenty in particular, there is around 48,000 people who give their volunteer hours, to come along and help 2,251 charitable trusts that are registered in the Bay.
"So today is important, to say thank you to those people that give generously of their time, their effort and their energy as well."
The trails are estimated to be used by more than 300,000 people a year.
