One of the main organisers of the convoy of Irish businesses was Chris Murphy, a resident of the Hunter Valley with a business in Sydney.

They were weary, but very pleased with their achievement and Chris said the convoy of 92 trucks and the drive was not hard to put together.

"John Hickey, here, he was instrumental, and also Peter in this truck here. It was the simplest thing that ever fell into motion," Chris said.

"It was incredible, everybody banded together. It was very simple."

John said the convoy brought 600,000 litres of stock water and 200,000 litres of bottled water.

"The water came from standpipes in different parts of Sydney, all the trucks had permits," he said.

Peter McMahon then walked into the interview, and as another organiser, said getting the convoy together was a big nightmare.

"There was nothing easy about it," he declared.

And the others all laughed loudly.

"I just told him it was easy," Chris said.

John laughed in his turn, and then said getting people to participate was easy.

"As soon as it was suggested, anyone who had a truck was, like, yeah definitely, we're ready to go."

At 11.30 am on Saturday, members of Armidale's four Rotary clubs were met with a cheery, clear, bright morning as they came together to set up barbecues and wait for the arrival of the convoy.

They were about to provide the visiting truck drivers and their families with a "thank you" lunch after they arrived at the Armidale Show Grounds.

North president Lyn Bruce said they were catering for 130.

"But that number has gone up because we're now hoping that some of the locals might come around," she said.

"Earlier, we were expecting between 90 and 120. It's all over Facebook apparently.

"We found out about it on Thursday afternoon, but all of our clubs are the same, if we've got something on, everyone comes in to help."

Rotary past district governor Bob Ryan was lined up to help distribute the water in conjunction with the Northern Tablelands Local Land Services.

"We've got 170 pallets of bottled water, all donated," he said.

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"They're desperate for bottled water for the farms near Walcha, they're worse than we are. I've got pallets of it going down there.

"I've got pallets going to Uralla because all along the plains they in all sorts of problems. So both the Rotary clubs of Uralla and Walcha are organising that."

Minister for Agriculture Adam Marshall arrived at the Show Ground to welcome the convoy along with Councillors from the Armidale Regional Council.

Council was strongly represented, and the significance of the event was not lost on Councillors Di Gray, Debra O'Brien, Brad Widders, Cr Andrew Murat and Libby Martin.

"I think we are seeing history being made here today," Cr Gray said.

Meanwhile, workers from the Armidale Regional Council were building an access road to the Armidale Airport Dam.

Council general manager Business Scot MacDonald said the Irish delivery was magnificent.

"This is the council Dam we use to supply the aerial operations of the RFS," he said.

"The water will probably supply three to four extra days of aerial fire fighting.

"The water was unloaded in an hour and is hugely appreciated by the New England community."

Perhaps a demonstration of how much the water was needed by the RFS came on Saturday evening, when smoke from the bushfires to the east of Armidale rolled across the countryside once again after a change of wind direction.

Mayor Simon Murray said he welcomed the water into the region.

"All that bottled water is going to be distributed into different directions," he said.

"The original plan was that all the bulk waster was to go to the LLS and that was to go up to Glen Innes for the farmers who had lost the water to the RFS.

"Now, I understand that decision had to be changed because the truck drivers were nearly at the end of their driving. So, they've had to go back a bit, and we're yet to see how much duty time they have left.

Cr Murray said if the drivers had some time left the RFS would welcome it if the trucks could fill empty 20,000 tanks near some fire stations, which were empty.

Mr Marshall said the convoy of water coming into town was a great thing to see.

"They've done this all off their own bat, just from the generosity of their own hearts," he said.

"They seem to be very much aware of what we are going through. Despite often we think that Sydney people don't care, or are just ignorant or don't understand what we are going through here, certainly there is a lot of attention focussed on the drought in Sydney and the metropolitan areas.

"It's been a team effort at this end, but nothing compares to their generosity."

Farmers wishing to place their name on a list for emergency water should phone 1899 814 647