It would be difficult to explain to a toddler why they can’t go and play in their favourite space this week, when they could last week.
But that’s what happened to Lee-Ann Hendry and her staff at Kitiwah Place on Power Road after last year’s floods.
“For the children, they lost their playspace – they lost this whole area for over twelve months,” Ms Hendry said.
Ms Hendry says when she left work on Friday, 25 February 2022, she thought the worst was over, and they were high and dry after all, this wasn’t the first Gympie flood she’d experienced at Kitiwah.
“I’ve been an employee here since 2006, so I’d seen a couple of floods. I was quite sure it wouldn’t come any further,” she said.
But on Sunday, she was met with a nasty surprise and discovered the lower play area of the centre had been completely flooded.
“I likened it to the apocalypse because I could get here, but no-one else could get here.
“There was water, there was a smell, and the helicopters,” she said, shaking her head at memory.
But resilience is strong with the team at Kitiwah, and rather than focussing on the negative, Ms Hendry chose to look upon the experience as a way to revitalise and renew an area of the complex, so their students could get the most benefit from it.
“That was the tennis court and it was a multi-purpose court, which was great, but after the floods I thought why not repurpose this area?” she said.
So, with a good deal of careful planning with their insurance money, they transformed the former tennis court into something much more exciting.
“We repurposed it into a purpose built roadcraft style trike track, complete with round about, and zebra crossings and fully shaded,” she said.
“It is now a beautiful edition to an already beautiful centre.”
And it’s useful, helping to teach their youngsters about road safety, while being a whole heap of fun at the same time.
“My assistant director and I may have got down here on the bikes and had a go before it officially opened,” she said with a mischievous twinkle in her eye.
In addition to the trike track, there are new pens for the chickens and for visiting small animals (something the Gympie RSPCA often do for the centre), a new sand pit and surrounds, new turf and vegetable gardens, trampolines and new swings and, ironically, a mud pit for messy play.
It was a long road to recovery for the centre and Ms Hendry acknowledged the help of several individuals and team members and especially the help of Rick and Dave from Cooloola Paving and Landscapes who took the Kitiwah team’s hand-drawn designs and made them a reality.
She said it took four months to complete the construction and the landscapers were onsite every day, gradually opening up the lower level in stages to allow the children to witness (from behind safety fencing) the entire process as it unfolded.
Last Tuesday, the centre had its official reopening to coincide with Toyota National Tree Day and Ms Hendry said Kitiwah was chosen by Toyota to be recipients of 40 native and bush tucker plants.
Ms Hendry said the centre works with Cooloola Cultural Connections to help embed a cultural awareness of how to utilise Australian bush tucker plants.
“It’s just magic with our natives here and outdoor gardens.
“The recovery has been a long process but we look at it now that we were able to repurpose, we were able to reallocate and then create something even better,” Ms Hendry said.
