THE COVID-19 pandemic has impacted many day to day things in our lives we have often taken for granted.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
But spare a thought for those who are trying to organise major events - like the Nowra Show for instance.
Show president Mark Stewart has said at this stage, as long as NSW's COVID-19 status remains the same the 2021, 145th Nowra Show will go ahead on Friday and Saturday, February 5-6.
Although there will be some changes and restrictions, including a cap on numbers and for the first time ever, the implementation of electronic tickets.
But inside the greater Nowra Show committee is a number of individual committees, each responsible for organising and running their own sections of each year's show.
And now each of those committees are also working to establish the new COVID guidelines put out by the Agricultural Societies Council and Health officials to ensure their section of the show can go ahead.
Take the woodchop competition for instance - what COVID precautions do they have to take?
For a start competitors have to be a minimum of four metres away from spectators .
That will lead to a reorganising of the woodchop arena at the Nowra Showground to ensure the competition can proceed safely.
To also ensure competitors' safety and there is the required distance under social distancing guidelines, the number of competitors in each event might also have to be restricted.
A special area will have to be put aside for the competitors and their family members.
And of course, a number of COVID marshals will also be needed to ensure crowd numbers in the spectator grandstands do not exceed allowable numbers.
Read More:
Especially for Nowra Show it will mean the annual challenge against New Zealand axemen won't be able to go ahead due to COVID.
At this stage competition at local shows will also be restricted to only one day.
All this and an axe hasn't even been swung in anger yet!
President of the South Coast and Tablelands Axemen's Association and well-known local woodchop identity Lindsay Parnell and Nowra Show woodchop chief steward Mark Bardley were at the woodchop arena last week, tape measure in hand.
"It's been a challenge, that's for sure," Mr Bradley said.
"The first thing we really had to do was get everyone on board and being in a position for us to even have an event.
"Some of the things we have been looking at is how many axemen are we allowed to have?
"How big the event can be?
"Spectators - a lot of the axemen bring their families along, whether we can actually have that.
"We are looking at capping the event for the Saturday only, as the numbers aren't likely to be as high as usual.
"But we are going to produce a schedule, a smaller sized program but there will still be plenty for people to see as long as they socially distance."
"It's all dependent of course on things not changing," Mr Parnell said.
"We've been working hard to try and figure out how we could do this.
"Another problem we have is getting timber, especially after all the bushfires.
"There's no one working in the forestry so we can't source any timber for the woodchop blocks.
"Luckily, it was cancelled earlier in the year and we have them left over but after that we don't know what we will do.
"We might be cutting pine - that'd be going backwards."
Hardwood for competition, particularly Messmate or Alpine Ash, is usually from near Cooma in the Badga State Forest from Forestry NSW.
Mr Parnell said there hasn't been a "sanctioned chopping competition since March".
"A few shows wanted to just have exhibitions but there was that much red tape that went with it all, the NSW Axemen's Association moved a motion that there was no woodchopping allowed until after Christmas," Mr Parnell said.
Mr Parnell actually got stuck in New Zealand when the restrictions came on - he was over there with the Australian veterans' team.
"We were away for eight days and came home a day after the restrictions came in so had to isolate for two weeks."
That meant he was also without contact with another of his passions, his bees for about three weeks.
"I lost a lot of my bees in the bushfires," he said.
"A lot got burnt and then the smoke and the heat killed the rest.
"We were smoked out for about a month. We didn't realise but a lot of the bees got disoriented and slowly dwindled away."
Due to COVID there will be no New Zealanders at this year's show, which is always a highlight and makes for a very competitive woodchop competition.
"If they come over here they will have to isolate or quarantine to go back home," Mr Bradley said.
"We will have to wait til next year to restart that challenge."
Although disappointing, all is not lost - there might be something special in the pipeline - a virtual competition might be able to be held.
"We probably could and it would be pretty cool," Mr Bradley said.
"Perhaps we need to investigate that.
"One of the reasons they come over each year is they like to participate in the Sydney Royal and the wood we use here is the same as Sydney so they use it as a warm up.
"They would be chopping in NZ with pine so that might be a disadvantage for us, unless we could get our logs over there to them."
"They might have to go into quarantine too," Mr Parnell laughed "or we could also chop in pine".
Normally the Nowra Show program includes a tree event, standing block and underhand.
"We've got to work out how we do it," Mr Bradley said.
"Where we usually stage underhand might be too close to the crowd. We have to work out where we stage that.
"It's more of a suck and see for us because we don't really know what we're dealing with.
"At least if we can get a program out on a best endeavours basis.
"To let everyone know what we are thinking of, it might be case of first in best dressed and got from there."
Mr Parnell said most shows on the South Coast would only be having a single day of chopping events.
"Kiama, Berry and Nowra will all follow suit with one day events just to get something on," he said.
"The problem is the four-metre rule, the standing block dummies are three metres apart.
"We just have to measure everything up - instead of maybe having eight or nine axemen in a heat we may only be able to have six."
There has also been an upgrade at the woodchop arena at the Nowra Showground with new lighting system "making night as bright as day."
"It was getting dangerous we were cutting in the dark," Mr Bradley said.
"The far end wasn't getting full light - now if you are here watching the chopping at night you might have to wear sunnies, it's that bright.
"We have run a test night chop and a lot of the guys in there said you actually need a cap. We're not complaining."
"It's also lit up the stands where people are sitting because they were in darkness," Mr Parnell said.
"That was a security worry as well."
They are determined to hold some sort of chopping event at this year's show, even if it's just an exhibition.
We depend on subscription revenue to support our journalism. If you are able, please subscribe here. If you are already a subscriber, thank you for your support.