Rotorua and Te Puia

HOT pool

Kia ora!

I'm actually back In Sydney Australia now.  And Stephanie is here!!!  But sorry, first things first.  Gotta catch up on NZ before telling you about our adventures.

Rotorua was the highlight of my stay on North Island even though it rained both days that I was there. A lot of the rain that falls on North Island happens while the sun if shining,

Great public thermal park 

what I call ghost rain.  It can be fairly light to medium and is intermittent.  But there are heaps of rainbows!  Almost everyday, several per day sometimes.  There's a faint sulphurous odor surrounding the Rotorua region.  You stop noticing it very quickly.

Rotorua is a great place to view geothermic activity.  I walked to one of the two city parks, Kuirau Park, near the CBD.  It's fantastic and FREE!!  Basically, the government has to fence off dangerous areas.  So I went from one fenced area to another and saw hot springs, pools, fumaroles, mudpools.  They were all bubbling, steaming, smoking, or glopping away (24/7, even when no one is watching).  All different sizes and shapes.  I'm easily amused; I spent a couple hours looking.

Medium size hot foot pool

At one end of the park, a boardwalk (20 meters/60'?) allowed me to walk over a corner of a very large hot pool.  Between the steam from the pool and the rain, I got pretty wet.  I also slipped and fell on some mud;  I caught myself but still landed on one hand and a buttcheek.  I didn't get very muddy but my hand hurt for several days.

There were also 3 footbaths, shallow pools lined with tile.  One could hold only a few people; the largest was maybe 10 X 3 meters.  They were under shelters lined with benches.  Nice gathering places, several families with small children were in the large one.

Walkway over steaming pond

The next day, I went to Te Puia ($46 entry + $10.30 for the show) on the bus ($2.30 each way).  Te Puia is home to Pohutu,  the largest of several geysers in the Whakarewarewa Valley. Geysers (pronounced guy zers, gee zers are old men) are thought to have intricate plumbing systems including chamber(s) that fill with hot water, steam and gases. When enough pressure builds up..., thar she blows!

Pohutu erupts an average of once or twice an hour and can reach heights of 30 meters/90'.  While I was there, Pohutu gushed continuously reaching up to 60-70'.  When it's raining, the underground reservoirs fill up faster. It's very powerful to see.  Prince of Wales Feathers Geyser and Kereru, smaller geysers next to Pohutu, also erupted continuously.

The Ngamokaiakoko (Koko's playthings or pets) Mud Pool is also called the Frog Pool because the plopping mud sounds like leaping frogs.  The large mud pool is the result of acid gases and steam that cause the decomposition of feldspar minerals to form Kaolin clay.  Kaolin is white when pure but finely divided black sulpher turns it grey.  The temperature of the mud is 90-95*C (200*F).

I wandered through the valley looking at the geothermic wonderland.  The water, pools and rocks are different colors due to the different minerals and temperatures.  There were two school groups, one with 8 - 10 year olds, the other with mid-teens.  What a great earth sciences field trip!

Another Te Puia highlight was the show in Rotowhio Marae.  A marae is the center of cultural life, performances, and important gatherings and events.  Although I'd seen the outsides of several and stepped (shoes off) into the (active) one in Te Papa Museum, I spent an hour in this marae (also shoes off).  The 45 minute show was entertaining, polynesian in flavor, similar to Hawaiian shows except for the gruesome facial expressions of the men during the kapa haka, or war dance.

Intimidating? Not in a cute skirt!

I finally saw live kiwi birds!  The nocturnal house featured a pair of kiwi.  I went to the Kiwi House 3 times.  I got a really good look for a few minutes during my first visit when there wasn't a tour in there.  One of the kiwi was wedged under a small log with its back to the window.  The other one was trying to get on top of the first by  stepping on a 3" rock behind the first.  It tumbled over off the rock twice, hilarious to watch, before giving up.  I didn't realize that NO pix are allowed in nocturnal houses; I thought only flashes were banned.


Kiwi are flightless, evolved so because there were no predators before the first mammals (other than a bat species), the Maori, arrived on Aotearoa (New Zealand).  Since then, dogs, wild cats, pigs, stoats, ferrets, and possums reduce the population by eating birds and eggs.  Captive breeding programs and registered nocturnal houses increase the captive population by about 10% annually.

This haka performer was terrific!

I also enjoyed watching demos at the National Maori Carving and Weaving schools.  The carving demo on a boat paddle was crowded; too bad the other demo was on a gunstock.  Traditional weaving is done with leaves of harekeke or NZ flax, Phormium tenax.  Cultivars are sometimes use for the colors but the fibers are not as reliably durable.

Te Puia's reconstructed Maori village, art and interpretive galleries, and main entrance structure and carvings provided further background to Maori culture in NZ and this geothermic region.  As Maori legend has it: long, long ago, explorer Ngatoroirangi climbed Mount Tongariro and almost died in freezing winds at the snow capped summit.  He called on the fire gods to help and they burst to the surface of the land to save him, leaving boiling mud pools and hot springs behind.

Pohutu, Feathers and Kereru geysers

Apparently the world's three best places to view spectacular geothermic activity are Rotorua, Yellowstone National Park, USA and somewhere in Iceland/Greenland(?).  While I recall being impressed by Yellowstone, I like that there are so many great examples in a walkable area in Rotorua.  (Yellowstone offers so much more than Old Faithful geyser and fumaroles.  Ya gotta go there, too!)

I had been looking forward to learning more about Maori culture, seeing  the facial expressions during a haka, and viewing live kiwi birds.   Te Puia provided all that and much more!  Rotorua is terrific.

Cheers!

Stuffed kiwi

Cyn

North Island vs South Island, New Zealand

Kia ora!

Well, I had to change my flight back to Australia.  I'm flying to Sydney on 26 May so that I can hook up with daughter Stephanie before flying together to Cairns.  It's just easier that way.  Besides, this gives me more time in NZ.

Auckland

My last two weeks in NZ on North Island were rushed.  I had kept hearing from locals and tourists that South Island is much nicer than North Island.  More to do, more to see.  So I spent 6 of my 8 weeks on South Island.  The biggest difference I noticed is that there are more roads.  That's because North Island is rounder.  Since I fly out of Auckland, near the top, I actually have to decide where I want to go; I can't just follow one road.

My fave North Island experience: Te Puia in Rotorua

The other major difference is that there are heaps more people and the towns are much larger.  NZ has 4 million people (and 40 million sheep).  Auckland metro area's population is over 1 million.  The whole of South Island is just under 1 million.  While traditional Maori arts, such as pounamu (greenstone or jade) and bone carving, are highlighted in a few towns on South Island, I noticed more Maori people and culture the further north I travelled.

I also noticed that the average age of tourists seemed to go up dramatically.  Most of the tourists I saw on South Island were young, 20s -30s.  Here, I'm seeing a lot of people in their 60s+.  Or maybe that's because I've been travelling and sight seeing and doing things like a young person.  Maybe my former busmates are more dispersed because there are more roads.  The hostels are not very full; I think there really are fewer young travellers on North Island.

My fave South Island adventure:
Walking on Franz Josef Glacier

Anyway, it has rained almost every day since I arrived back in Wellington.  I went back to Te Papa to take another look at their earthquake and volcano exhibits; it is a world class museum.  From Wellington, I went to Napier.  Much of Napier was destroyed in an earthquake in 19­31.  When it was rebuilt, many of the buildings were in the Art Deco style.  Napier also has a nice beach promenade.  It would've been nicer without rain.

The scenery between Napier and Taupo seemed unusual to me.  The terrain undulated unevenly with lots of small and medium hills and a mountain or two.  There was evidence of many slippages, old and new landslides. Apparently the area has 3 volcanoes and many thousands of years ago, thick layers of ash fell.  Easily eroded and with few nutrients, land use is mostly forestry and sheep grazing and more recently, dairy cow grazing.

I was the only passenger on the shuttle between Taupo and Rotorua and the driver, Harry, provided scenic commentary.  The Taupo area is renown for geothermic activity and there are 8 geothermal power plants in operation, the newest completed last year.  Activities such as white water rafting and ATV/quad bike riding take advantage of the dams.  Signs for hot water pools and parks appear regularly for a long stretch of road.  Clouds of steam dot the countryside, visible through the rain.

Favorite Place: Te Papa Museum in Wellington
And it's free!!

Dairy has become big business in NZ.  Fonterra has been buying up land and establishing large dairy farms with 2000 - 3000 head.  Most of the older farms have about 200 cows and sell their milk to be processed by Fonterra's regional plants, each of which produce different milk, butter, or cheese products primarily for export.

Next up, mudholes, geysers, and Maori culture in Rotorua.

Cheers!
Cyn

Feijoas, Fay ho ahs, Fe jo ahs

Kaikoura Beach

Kia ora!

My next wwoofing job was with the Krums at Windsong Orchards in Renwick.  I took the InterCity bus which left Christchurch at 7 am.  The Babes were nice enough to drive into town to drop me off.  Jennifer Krum was nice enough to drive into Blenheim to pick me up.

As usual, the scenery during the 5 hour drive was varied and pleasant, although it was foggy and rainy.  The coastal drive around Kaikoura was a highlight.  There were thousands of seals on the rocks about 20-30 minutes north of Kaikoura, which is the best place in NZ to go whale and other wildlife watching.

Kaikoura Beach

Windsong Orchards produces fruit during an extended market season.  Blueberries come on as early as November, about 40 varieties of plums go through the summer, then table grapes, with feijoas finishing in June.  They've planted kiwifruit which will begin producing next autumn.  They're contemplating replacing some of the less productive feijoa trees with persimmons since there seems to be a glut of feijoas.  Many people have a feijoa tree or two of their own.

BTW, the word is pronounced "feh jo ah" in deference to the Portuguese origins of the fruit (although in Kiwi-nese it sounds like "fee jo ah").  I've pronounced it "fay ho ah" because of the Mexican influence in California.  I've sold many feijoa, aka pineapple guava, trees because they are pest and disease resistant, small and thus good for urban gardens, evergreen/gray, and well suited to our California climate.  As a bonus, they produce fruit.  Didn't know much about the fruit, but now I do.

Feijoas!  Very yummy!

How can you tell when a feijoa is ripe?  Answer is: when it falls off the tree.  (I don't know of any other fruit like that.  Do you?)  So harvesting is sort of like hunting for Easter eggs.  You stoop under the tree looking carefully for fruit, then pick them up.  You can't mow very often because the ripe fruit will be destroyed.  Hard on the back. Since it was just past the peak season and we already had an over supply, we only harvested every other day.

I hadn't eaten a feijoa before; I'm not sure if I'd ever even seen the fruit before.  They are firm and shaped like a kiwifruit with a bumpy/lightly ridged green skin. There is a light fragrance which is slightly stronger when the fruit is opened. The flesh is smooth yet gritty, like some pears can be.  The taste is light, not too sweet and refreshing; it may be a little sour/bitter close to the skin.  The fruit is best eaten by cutting it in half and eating the flesh with a spoon.

Windsong grows 3 varieties.  Apollo are very large, up to 160 grams (6 ounces); trees are very productive mid season.  Unique are normal sized, 100 to 150 grams; very productive early season.  Pounamu are smaller, up to 120 grams with less gritty flesh and a smoother skin; not very productive.   Seconds are smaller fruit.  Sometimes it was hard to decide where a specific one should go.  We composted the smallest fruits.

We left before 7 am to set up for the weekly Blenheim Market about 10 minutes away on Sunday, Mother's Day.  This market and a Wednesday market in Nelson, an hour away, are their primary distribution channel.  There's also a small stand at the front gate where fruit is sold on an honor basis.  Feijoas are $4 for a 1 kilo prepacked bag.  An additional channel is selling wholesale at $2/kilo to the produce store or supermarkets.  The problem is that the fruit can sit and look bad or sell out and not get restocked.  Either way means there are few repeat orders without checking in repeatedly.

Feijoas at Windsong Orchards in Renwick, NZ

At the Sunday market, I helped to unload and set up canopies (not pop-up), stalls, signs, chairs, etc.  Then I scrubbed and chopped potatoes for the cafe in exchange for breakfast, a fresh vegie omelet and pain chocolate (pastry).  Yum!  I tended our stall for a little while. One or two kilo combo bags or choose your own at $4/kilo.  Prepacked 1 kilo bags of seconds sold for $3.

Jennifer allowed me to prune blueberry bushes with her; she'd never let a wwoofer prune before.  After checking my work, she wanted me to stay and help her do all 900 plants.  I also patched up side netting and got a demo on plum tree pruning.  On a rainy day, I made and bottled 2 batches of kasundi, an Indian relish/chutney normally made with tomatoes. I substituted feijoas, of course!

Pruning blueberry bushes

I had a great time with the Krums.  Bob grew up in SoCal.   The Kiwi Krums go to Santa Barbara for 6 weeks annually during their winter/California summer, so there's a chance I'll see them again.   Another BTW, kiwi in NZ are either 1)the bird or 2)the people.  What we call kiwi is always referred to as kiwifruit.

I ate at least 10 - 15 feijoas (seconds) daily during my 5 day stay and took some (20 or so) away with me.  I had a couple hours in Picton before my ferry to Wellington and had curry at an Indian restaurant.  While I was there, I asked a young man from Pittsburgh to join me.  We and his brother and 2 Brits I had first met in Queenstown ended up staying at the same hostel.  I shared my feijoas with them; none had tried them before.

Cheers!
Cyn

Rugby and Netball

Kia ora!

I attended my first rugby game.  The Babe's son, Laurence, plays for the Sumner club team.   The biggest differences between rugby and American football are that other than a mouthguard, the 13 players wear no padded protection and they play both offense and defense.  You can hear them crunching into each other - OUCH!  Also, play is continuous with no huddles or chain moving.

The oval ball, slightly fatter than an American football, cannot be passed forward, only behind or laterally.  The team gains ground by running or kicking the ball.   Any player may kick the ball at any time.  Either team may recover the ball.  Offensive players must be behind the ball carrier.

If the ball carrier is tackled to the ground, he must release the ball immediately or there is a penalty.  A ruck forms as his team mates protect the ball.  If the ball goes "into touch" (out of bounds), there is a line-out awarded against the team that last touched the ball.  The players line up perpendicular to the touch (sideline), one team on each side and a meter apart, and the ball is thrown into the gap by a member of the awarded team.  Team members can jump or lift each other into the air to try to get the ball.

There are many rules about tackling, including only the ball carrier can be tackled.  Fouls often incur scrums where the players hold on to each other to form a block and line up against the other team  to tackle each other for possession of the ball.  The ref tells them when to "Crouch... Touch...  Pause... Engage."  The ball must be kicked backward until a player can get it safely and strategically into play.

Scoring: a try is a 5 point score where the player must ground the ball past the goal line.  After a try is scored, the team can attempt a conversion bonus, 2 points if the ball is kicked over the goal crossbar from the field in line with where the ball touched the ground for the try, from any distance.  A goal of 3 points occurs if the ball is kicked over the goal crossbar during play.  Penalty kicks often result in these goals.

There are two 40 minute halves during which play rarely stops.  They don't even stop when players are injured.  I think the team plays short until a determination is made about substitution.  There are few time-outs, few substitutions  and play is much faster than football.  It was so  interesting to watch and learn that I forgot I had a camera and didn't take any pix.  Darn!

I also saw my first netball game.  Laurence's girlfriend, Monica, is on the team that plays at Lincoln University.  Netball is a popular primarily women's game played worldwide but especially in England and Commonwealth countries.  It's similar to basketball except that there's no backboard and no dribbling.

What a shock it would have been

Netball is a passing game; no ball bouncing, running with the ball, or double possession allowed.   It's a fast game; a player can have possession of the ball for only 3 seconds at a time.  The 7 players must keep within their zones and it is player to player defense.  Within the shooting circle, a 900 cm (must be almost a meter away from ball carrier/shooter) defense rule is enforced.

Each ball into the 10' high net is 1 point.  After any goal, the center from alternating teams starts the volleyball-sized ball into play from the center circle.  Substitutions occur during the brief quarter breaks and time outs are rare.  Easier than rugby to understand and watch.  The girls work hard!

Damaged church in Christchurch

Sumner is 45 minutes through Christchurch from Broadfield so I saw a lot of earthquake damage along the way. Damage is widespread; many suburbs were also heavily affected.   The February 22 earthquake registered 6.3 magnitude and killed 163 people.  The September 4, 2010 earthquake was a 7.1 with no fatalities.

Gnarly old Eucalyptus tree

There are cliffs, similar to those in Malibu along the Pacific Coast Highway, where homes have been red tagged because they have fallen or in danger of doing so.   Many streets have been/are being repaved from road damage.  All the manholes in a broad area are raised a few inches.  Weird.  Some neighborhoods are using Porta-potties because the sewerage systems are still being repaired.

The Babes also dropped me off to see the Christchurch Botanical Gardens, one of the few tourist attractions near the CBD recently reopened to the public.  I especially admired the big native trees with their gnarly or shredded trunks and the heather, rock and demo gardens.  Although the Canterbury Museum and the Art Gallery were closed due to quake damage, there were a few nice sculpture on the grounds.

I had a wonderful 6 day stay with the Babes, meeting their family and friends, and learning about so many new things.  They wanted me to stay longer and I would have loved to, but I had already made a commitment to my next wwoofing hosts.

Cheers!
Cyn

Blueberry Bliss

Rolling up bird netting.

Kia ora!


So I got dropped off at my next wwoofing job in Broadfield at 4:45 on Saturday, the morning after the Royal Wedding.  I had to knock twice before Wendy came to open the door.  She showed me to my room and where the toilet and bathroom (real ones!) were and we both went back to bed.  She said that they had hosted a Royal Wedding dinner party where everyone had gotten dressed up and partied late.  They wouldn't be up until about 10.  Awfully nice and flexible.

I was awaken at 5:40 by several jolts.  An earthquake?  Well, I am in a suburb of Christchurch where they've had more than 5000 sizeable aftershocks.  Oh, well.  It's not shaking any more.  I rolled over and went back to sleep.  Just past 7 am, I'm awakened by another shake.  Jeez!  I'm just trying to get some sleep!  This one didn't feel as strong with a rolling motion but lasted long enough for me to get out of bed and get under the doorway.  Then I went back to bed.

Wire and pole supports. And irrigation - half on ground.

We found out later that they were 3.8 and 4.2 respectively, both about 9 km underground with the second one occuring on a different fault than the Christchurch quake and thus, it was an earthquake in itself and not an aftershock.  I don't remember having so many large aftershocks after big earthquakes in California.  We probably had them; I just don't remember.

I learned heaps at Blueberry Bliss, a pick your own blueberry farm with 1500 southern highbush blueberry bushes.  It was time to take the bird netting off for the winter.  Two ends of the orchard are permanently fenced/netted.  The other two sides and the top are netted with one enormous sheet of bird netting.  A grid of wire lines is strung from posts (6 meters? apart) along the sides of the orchard.  A block of wood is attached at each intersection and a pole sits in a notch on the underside to raise the grid up.  The bird netting sits on top of the wire grid.

One huge net is getting bulky and heavy!

My first job was to take the raised heads of the irrigation sprinklers down which just means unscrewing the last riser/head section and laying it out of the way on the ground.  Then the hard work begins.  One person (me) takes down the support poles a section at a time so that another one or preferably two people can roll up the netting as tightly as possible and get it over the wire.   All whilst minding the plants and irrigation.  Then the support poles get put back up.


In the beginning, it's not so hard but as we got further into the orchard, the rolled up netting got bulkier and heavier.  Wendy and I did almost the whole orchard ourselves in about 6 hours over 2 days.  I reattached the irrigation risers.  We spent another 2 hours tieing the netting to the supports on the 4th side.  By this time, the roll of bird netting is about 14" diameter.  Heavy work.

Before....

Then I learned how to prune blueberry bushes.  Blueberries ripen in the summer.  During autumn, flower/fruit buds are produced and the shrubs lose their leaves. The shrubs are dormant during the winter.  Most of the pruning occurs during winter.  So you can already see the buds of your potential crop.  Pollination and leaf development occur in spring.  Then the shoots, fruit, and leaves all grow through spring and summer.

Blueberries fruit on second year wood and those berries are large.  Fruit on third year wood are usually large as well.  Fruit gets smaller on older wood especially since new shoots have formed and there are more berries supported on the older wood.    Each bud produces 6 -12 flowers.

And after.

The idea is to have a good amount of big berries on each bush.  So you want to keep fresh, red wood and strong second year wood, especially if it has lots of flower/fruit buds.  You can't cut all the older wood cuz then there wouldn't be very many berries.  Older canes with little new wood are cut down.  The rest is judgement.  Well, I have plenty of knowledge on the theory of pruning.  It was practical experience that I was lacking.

So Wendy let me at it.  I pruned a few bushes and then she went over them with me.  I wasn't taking enough off.  My theory is that you can always take more off but you can't stick what you took off, back on.  So I got more aggressive.  Much better.

Pet rabbit named Frederick Winston AKA Stew or Stu

Most of the bushes are about 20 years old. On poorly performing bushes, Wendy sometimes takes almost all the canes to the ground to stimulate new growth.  If they don't perform next year, she'll yank the plants and replace them with different varieties to improve fruit yield or timing.    Some years they haven't been able to prune all the bushes.  So Wendy has experimented by hedge shearing  every other bush to look at berry density, size, or yield.  She wants to take notes and pictures of specific pruning techniques and measure results the following year.  Good idea.

I really enjoy pruning blueberry bushes, deciding what to cut and what to keep.  I'd love to see the fruits of my labor.  When I have a home again, I will definitely grow blueberries, in containers if necessary.

Cheers,
Cyn

Sheep Mustering and Christchurch

Got'em where I want'em!

Kia ora!

Sheep mustering is the best thing I can say about my next wwoofing job.  The rest was not so good.  I should have been forewarned.  Glen (and Ivy) was my first host that made initial contact.  I hadn't even thought about a host doing that.  And since he was so nice to ask, I agreed to wwoof with him.

Ewes and 1 ram in upper paddock over the road

I took the 8 am bus from Queenstown on Thursday, May 28.  I arrived at 4:45 pm, 30 minutes late due to traffic (!) at the temporary Christchurch bus terminal since the regular one is in the earthquake damaged cordoned off CBD.  Glen picked me up and gave me a mini tour of some of the damage while it was still light out.  After stopping at the grocery store, Pak n Save (yes, the American chain), we started on the 1 hour drive to Little River on the Banks Peninsula.

The rams went past the gate, we need them through!

On the way, he informed me that although he's been living on his land for almost 5 years he has concentrated on the land and not his home.  He doesn't have a proper toilet.  He has a camping toilet that he empties once a week.  He's learned to take one bath a week.  I listened, gulped, and said laughingly, "What have I let myself in for?!"

Well, it wasn't that bad.  The toilet sits in the workshed next to the house.  It's about 14" high and about 12" square and it didn't stink.  Enough said.  The "bath" is a bathtub set by the creek with a shower head over it.  The shower head is attached to a gas heater to heat the water.  (But it's okay.  I didn't have to use it.)

Where do you want us to go?!

Because... Glen informed me the next morning that he and Ivy were flying to Auckland on Saturday.  Their flight leaves at 5:40 am.  With a 1 hour drive, they were leaving at 4 am.  I had 2 options, I could stay there until they got back on Monday (no way!!!) or they could drop me off somewhere.

So Glen went off to work from 9 - 3  leaving me with Ivy.  Ivy is 29, shy and uncertain about her English skills, and arrived in NZ from Taipei 8 months ago.  She wwoofed at Glen's for 2 weeks with a girlfriend when she first arrived, came back alone for a 6 week stay and after travelling a little more, she's back at Glen's.  She's spent half of her time in NZ here.

My turn! My turn!

We harvested all the tomatoes off the frost damaged vines, pulled the plants and then picked up the area to prevent copious tomato seedlings next year.   I could follow Glen's instructions and Ivy knew where things were/went so we were able to get the job done.  If either of us had been alone, it would have been much more difficult and not done properly.  I guess that's why Glen wanted me to wwoof, to be company for Ivy.  I also doctored and restaked a small lemon tree that had been knocked over by a previous wwoofer with a mower.  Greg thought it was dead/dying; I'm sure it will be fine.

Hey! What're you looking for?

I was supposed to call my next hosts, the Babes, and arrange the specifics of my stay with them from Glen's.  So after thinking about it during the day and discussing timing with Glen, I called them and asked if I could be dropped off at their place very early the next morning.  Wendy said yes.  4:45 am early?  Yes. What a good sport!

Then we went to muster the sheep.  Mustering sheep just means getting them together and moving them from one place to another.  First we had to get another person; the more people the better.  We stopped by to see if Glen's neighbor, Jerry, was home.  Ivy let me out of the back seat; she wasn't going up to Jerry's house.

Mt Cook on the way to Christchurch

I understood why very soon.  Jerry's house is at least a 5-8 minute walk from the road.  You have to cross over a creek over which a 14" (?) wide board has been laid with a rope overhead just in case you slip.  Then the track is uphill, steep and slippery in places.  Jerry's lived there for 20 years and everything has been carried up by hand.  He's laid a floor using (mostly beer) bottles neck down for a base.  Thankfully, he was home.  Glen got Jerry's mobile phone # for the future.

Lake Tekapo near Christchurch

The aim of the job was to change out the ram that was with the ewes.  Simple!  Not!!!  Sheep are herding animals and spook easily.  First we had to get 3 rams down from the pasture, across the creek, and into a corral.  We crossed the creek by precarious rock hopping, easier for the guys with longer legs.  Glen and Jerry climbed up the hills.  Ivy and I were positioned strategically to block the sheep from going back up the hill and encourage them to cross the creek.

One of the rams caught sight of us too early and bolted back up the hill.  We had to start all over again.  This time Ivy and I had to climb up one of the hills to block their way and then run through the bush (I only slipped once!) to block open areas where they could escape back uphill.  Eventually the sheep went over the creek, through the gate, along the road, and finally, into the designated corral.

Just a sample of the very widespread damage

We get them to go where we want by pincering them, slowly walking as a group toward them while their bodies are facing the right way.  If you want them to turn, someone needs to gently make themselves noticed (step out from behind a post/bush) at the right place and time.  If they are looking straight at you, you quietly move your arms slowly to dissuade them from charging your way.  It takes a lot of patience and forethought to muster sheep.



Next, we had to move about 14 ewes and the lucky ram to another corral.  Same thing, the guys go up the hills, we are near the bottom.  It took little time to get them down from the upper paddocks.  Getting the first one to go through the gates of the corral took more time; after the first one was through, the others pushed and shoved to follow.  Then Glen had to figure out which one was the ram, by looking, and release him.

The black faced ram was the new lucky one and after he joined the ewes, we moved them back to the upper paddock.  We released another small flock to a back paddock and moved the 3 rams back down and across the road to their pasture.  Done!  Finally!  It took about 2 hours to move about 25 sheep around.

The 2 front domes of the Cathedral collapsed

Ivy doesn't like mustering sheep because she's had to do it several times.  The last time, she and Glen chased the 3 rams around for an hour and couldn't get them over the creek.  I had fun; it was my first (and only) time.   I was at this wwoof job for a total of 36 hours.

Bbaaaaa!!
Cyn

Arrowtown Chinese Settlement

Kia ora!

One last adventure from Qtown.  I took a bus ($17 day pass) to The Remarkables Shopping Center and then to Arrowtown.  Not too much remarkable about the shopping center.  But Arrowtown was interesting.  It's an historic gold rush town noted for its restored Chinese Settlement.

Between the late 1860s and the 1880s approximately 8000 Chinese men, primarily from Canton/Quongdong (where my ancestors are from) province, came to the Otago Southland and West Coast regions of New Zealand to seek their fortunes in gold.

By 1865, the initial gold rush in the Otago province was over and the European miners were moving to the new West Coast goldfields.  The Otago Councilmen decided to recruit Chinese miners from the Australian goldfields to prevent their towns from dying out.

Inside Ah Lum's Store

Initially, the Chinese were well received.  But by the 1870s, Chinese men represented 17% of the Otago Southland goldfield population, 40% of its miners and

produced 30% of its gold.  As the Chinese
community and commercial interests grew, so did resentment.  While the Chinese in Arrowtown escaped physical violence, they did endure verbal abuse led by racist newspaper articles and discriminatory legislation.

By 1890, Otago's easily worked gold was played out and most of the Chinese moved on, most returning to China.  Some remained and found other work, particularly market gardening.   As the competitive environment eased, harassment also lessened.  They are remembered as "honest, hard working and kindly people."  Some of the initial immigrants married European wives and their families integrated successfully into New Zealand society.

Ah Lum's Store/bank/lodging/gathering place

Similar to America and Australia, New Zealand government efforts to restrict Chinese immigration continued well past World Was II.    New Zealand opened its doors more widely to Chinese immigration in the 1980s.

2 homes built into mountainside.  Center: storage hut.

I enjoyed seeing the restored Chinese Settlement.  I know Chinese, particularly Southern Chinese, are short but these buildings were ridiculous!  They must've only been able to stand up straight in the center, if that.

Ah Lum spoke English and served as interpreter and scribe.  Also known as Lau Lei, he and his store lived until 1925 and were the heart of the Chinese community.  Ah Sing's store was the largest building in the Settlement and was his home, store, restaurant, boarding house and social center.

Having grown up in San Francisco's Chinatown, I've seen Chinese frugality in action.  I remember Gramps' tiny room with the toilet and bath tub down the hall and stove/oven, refrigerator, and table/4 chairs in the shared kitchen.  Granma's place on Stockton Street wasn't much bigger.  Hey!  They had private rooms in a hostel! But they lived like that for decades. Less than 1 year is enough for me.

Inside of mountainside home

I miss good cheap Asian food!!  I want pho!  I want clay pot tofu/dried fish or eggplant!
Cheers!

Arrowtown village green

Cyn