Well, we are now wrapping up our five weeks at Denny's Orchard before moving on from our Alex and Clyde homes. To share more about what we actually do there, we took the camera in for a closer look at how cherries and pears are processed. Below you can see the process a cherry goes through in the packing plant - from being sorted (graded, stems separated) then down the cleansing 'waterslides' before coming to us on a conveyor for inspection and boxing (by Christina), and for weighing and stacking on a pallet in the "chilly bin" (by Kirby). We celebrated [View Full Entry]

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After helping the orchard get caught up on the fruit backlog, our first seven days of work was rewarded with two days off and a 5kg box of 2nd grade cherries; we thoroughly enjoyed both. We took to the road straight from work to explore some of the treasures Central Otago has to offer. First stop was Cromwell where we met Duane and Charlotte at a neighbourhood pub for some supper and to share fruit/work stories. After some laughs, we continued North, stopping in Twizel for the night. The following morning we made it to Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest mountain. [View Full Entry]

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So after a nice two days off with many kms and petrol, we were back at work switching from peaches and apricots to cherries in full swing. With the new direction, we also got new work mates. It could have started off more smoothly; the first two days with the new crew were rendered useless as the graders were not doing a good enough job for export standards. Therefore, on the day we were supposed to have off, Christina and I got to come back to unpack, re-sort, and re-pack all of the cherries. Although very similar, "resort" and "re-sort" have [View Full Entry]

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If one would recall from our last blog, we were about to embark on finding a solution for our season, aka jobs. Saturday morning came and we went to seasonal solutions at 10 am. I might add here we knew it was 10 am because there is a large clock in the mountain range that overlooks Alexandra. Anyways we went, waited in a small line until we were next. This is when we met Ann. She was one of the people that hooks humans up with fruit. Upon talking to her, we were hoping to find picking jobs in a town [View Full Entry]

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Time keeps moving, blogging gets put on the back burner, however, the blog must live on to give light to our memories and home hemisphere. As the time has past since our last update, blog items have tallied, therefore expect a string of them over the next while. We will now pick up where we left off in Dunedin. Christina and I were about to leave Dunedin, which was a perfect fortress of peers and security, with ample space, running water, cuddly companions (Slinky and Toby), as well as two incredible Canadians, Duane and Charlotte. The time had come for us [View Full Entry]

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We saw a few sights around Dunedin after Christmas, went to one of the beaches, and managed to get the van's exhaust system fixed too - it is so much quieter! We went for a tour of Speight's Brewery, one of the oldest and sole remaining gravity fed breweries in the world. We had a great guide who made the tour very entertaining; he even recommended the folk music festival we would later attend for New Years. We helped Duane and Charlotte with some yard clean-up and enjoyed the sunshine; Christina weeded the garden and Kirby mowed the steeply sloped lawn [View Full Entry]

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Christmas morning after breakfast we opened some gifts from various Santas around the world, including Charlotte and Duane. Thank you to everyone who sent little envelopes with us! Charlotte and Duane planned an awesome dinner so we made and enjoyed turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, vegetables, a salad, buns, and stuffing. The meal was the closest semblance of a North American tradition as Christmas is not celebrated with as much extravagance here. Christmas marks the beginning of New Zealand's summer holidays and many of the "white Christmas" traditions do not have meaning; people do not se [View Full Entry]

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Week 3: Making our way from Auckland South to Dunedin Leaving Auckland we enjoyed the first drive through the countryside to our first stop: Rotorua. Rotorua is a city filled with natural hot springs; you can see our 'camp site' under the tree, it had a beautifully clear stream running beside and black swans. Our first night in Tui: we left the seats in our van as they fold down flat, our bed is an air mattress on top and luggage on one side; we sleep at rest stops wherever we need a break. We stayed in Rotorua two nights, Christina [View Full Entry]

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Week 2: Auckland, NZ We arrived in Auckland and made it through the most friendly customs ever - they opened our Christmas presents but didn't tell us what they were, we didn't even peek! We found some maps and caught a shuttle to Evelyn and John's place in Albany (North Shore of Auckland). Their home, aptly called the Treehouse, is beautiful and surrounded by trees with a path leading down to a stream. It was hardly what we had pictured when arriving in New Zealand's largest city. They welcomed us with open arms and spoiled us rotten with great meals, laundry [View Full Entry]

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Leaving Canada was kind of romantic with the truck breaking down in a blizzard on the drive between Regina and Edmonton where we flew out Tuesday, December 4th. Kirby brought some frostbite in remembrance of the cold we left behind. Our first flight was to Los Angeles, then on to Nadi, Fiji in the South Pacific. We arrived Thursday morning (20 hour time change ahead) to hot humid weather and got a shuttle to our hostel on Nadi Bay. We had booked a trip to the Yasawa Islands for 4 days, however, hurricane Daman was threatening the area so travel was [View Full Entry]

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