Long known for its incomparable landscapes and scenery, Wānaka can also be gaining a deserved history of its sustainability-driven wholefood scene and regenerative innovations.
Avid explorers and wilderness wanderers have long been drawn to the lakeshores and alpine peaks of recent Zealand's Wānaka region. Māori summer campsites, known as 'kainga', were the very first warning signs of human settlement here, dotted round the crystal-clear lakes.
By the 1860s, English prospectors flocked to the region, looking to strike rich throughout the gold rush, and later, thrill-seeking adventurers venturing to conquer its mighty mountains arrived. The spirit of these explorers remains in the small Wānaka community today, with folks forging deep connections to the place they now call home along with a new generation of businesses committed to preserving the land for future years.
Bike Glendhu is Wānaka's first purpose-built mtb park, opened at the beginning of 2022. It is the brainchild of farmer John McRae and health and wellness expert John Wilson. The stunning bike park boasts an amazing network of mountain trails for two-wheeled explorers. Evelyn Vallillee and Jesse Herbert run Bike Glendhu's food hub, Velo Cafe, concentrating on fast, healthy, 'approachable' wholefoods that challenge things as they are for many adventure park food.
Love for landscape
A respect for that environment is a part of their practices. Both bike park and café are run by solar panel systems and the water is sourced from Glendhu Station. “We avoid takeaway coffee cups. Rather we offer sit-in or 'Wanakup', just one cup exchange program which has proven to be successful in our small town of Wānaka,” says Herbert.
“All items which require packaging within the café are 100 per cent recyclable or home compostable. We've built a four-bay composting system so everything (food waste, packaging, etc.) is reduced to soil on-site. We utilize this soil each year for that garden beds to grow garnishing herbs and flowers.”
Love for landscape runs deep locally, plus a welcoming attitude towards people who arrived at visit. Nestled amongst rows of trees and looking out towards snow-capped mountains may be the Camp, a lakeside accommodation that provides tents and powered sites, cabins, cottages, holiday houses, glamping villages and a tiny house.
“It's the top country hospitality we deliver that's stick out about our place. We treat everyone who comes here like a mate and make certain they leave feeling like one. Regardless of what accommodation type they choose,” says Gm Tom Gerlach.
“We are busy organising a residential area day at The camp ground where we will invite the locals to re-engage with this particular space, whether that be to stay in our accommodation options or eat and drink at our Food Truck and Bar or maybe even bring the children down for just about any fish, walk to be able to play in the park. We're adamant this special place should be enjoyed through the neighborhood. We absolutely prioritise local suppliers from a food and beverage perspective and will ramp this up over summer as our food truck and bar start to take off.”
The Camp's environmental initiatives vary from chemical and single-use plastic eradication, to waste reduction and composting. “Some in our newest initiatives range from the ongoing growth and development of a trapping line that we'll utilise not just in help eradicate pests but additionally to teach our guests on the requirement for pest eradication,” says Gerlach. “We will also be building upon our composting initiative using the introduction from the hen house where guests and youngsters can feed the chooks using their compost and collect eggs.”
There can be a tenacious spirit amongst the business owners in Wānaka, many of whom make major career pivots. Lucy Conway is a lawyer-turnedcafé owner, who opened Scroggin café in January 2022. “Wānaka had been an attractive destination to me,” she says. “The vision behind Scroggin is always to purchase as local as you possibly can and make up a wholefood menu. So we make just about everything in house and support as numerous local growers and purveyors as possible. It's bringing food to its roots and letting the meals actually speak for itself.”
Seasonality drives recption menus, sourcing produce from Basil, Parsley and Partners in Cromwell and meat from local butcher Neat Meat, which they use to create their very own in-house sausages and bacon. The café intends to sell its own packaged scroggin (trail mix), granola and seed bread, along with host events like supper clubs and poetry nights. The particular café embodies both her love for “all things good” and Wānaka's rugged wilderness, using the interiors – created by local Undercurrent Studio – similar to backcountry huts with natural wood plus a handcrafted feel.
Says Conway: “Some of the greatest eating memories are when I'm in a backcountry hut having a bunch of friends. That's what I required to replicate within Scroggin.”
Local & wholesome
Caitlin Ovenden and her husband, Max, started their small Hawea Flat farm, Wild Things Wānaka, after New Zealand's first lockdown. Their business is built round the practices of regenerative farming, returning what was previously a cattle pasture into healthy, fertile and biodiverse land providing produce to local restaurants and stores.
Wild Things runs on the ethos that things are part of a cycle. “Chickens provide manure which gets composted, which goes to fertilising our plants, that will get pulled and fed towards the chickens,” says Caitlin. “By starting with the soil, using natural systems instead of chemical fertilisers to revive the soil's fertility and growing capacity, along with making sure we keep our biodiversity abundant round the property, we're supporting hundreds of different ecosystems both underground and above. The greater we are able to sustain ourselves through our actions here on our farm, the greater that sustainability may then spread further into our community.”
She says the attention within the provenance of meals are ever-growing locally. “We were lucky in this manner, establishing Wild Things Wānaka immediately after the pandemic.
“People were seeking to bring things to local, wholesome systems they might rely on, even when other things around them seemed a little unreliable,” she says. “I knew which i seriously considered associated with growing food for my community and adding to the 'slow foods' idea.”
She believes places like Wild Things can perform a lot more than supply food, but inspire and educate. “I loved the idea of having the ability to create a place where people could come and learn, feel at home and participate what we should used to do.” Their vision would be to carry on growing the company and finally open an outlet front, where they could sell produce alongside other growers, farmers and artisan goods.
“We will also be utilizing a group centered on the meals community within Wānaka, spearheaded by Naomi Lindsay [of Forage & Feast] to start a non-for-profit charitable trust to inspire connections among the community of growers, chefs, artisan producers and sellers. This may be an amazing chance to grow our food economy within Wānaka which makes it more available to anybody attempting to be concerned.”
