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Published: September 14th 2005
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Hello!!
Conscious that things have been a little quiet from our corner lately, here's an update on the latest of our travels.
We have both now finished working (hurrah!): Rach F at the dairy farm and Rach B at the hostel, the Old Countryhouse, and the cinema. Jen has arrived from the UK, George has been and gone in her visit to NZ and we are leaving NZ tomorrow!!
To fill in the gaps would take rather a long time, but I will detail a few now. Rach F has become an expert in delivering calves, she has many stories to tell, which I will leave to her. Rach B has learnt much from working for 2 small business owners and about running a backpacker hostel...!! The cinema job was awesome, primarily because I was being paid to talk about films, and then got into films for free!
On Jen's arrival, Rach F and Jen hit the road in Johan's car (kindly hired for a minimal fee), travelling around the south of the south island - over to Fox glacier, Wanaka, Dunedin and back up to Christchurch. Dave and Claire, buddies from Auckland, visited in Christchurch aswell,
and it was lovely to see them again.
Once Rach B had completed her last ever shift (can't hide the excitement) at the hostel, Rach B, Rach F and Jen visited the dairy farm Rach F worked on. (are you confused yet?!) Jen and RB even got to see a calf being born! Totally excellent, only a bit icky. Headed back to Christchurch, and went on the TranzAlpine train journey the next day. The weather had been quite foggy in Christchurch and unfortunately the spectacular views promised didn't materialise on the outward journey. However, the weather cheered up in the afternoon, so we got to see it all eventually. Rather than taking the train all the way to Greymouth, which is the last stop, we decided to jump ship at Moana, next to Lake Brunner. Had a nice stroll along the water's edge, had lunch on the beach. Got bitten by many sandflies. not nice. Took a stroll through a forest and had a coffee. Superbly relaxing.
The following day, Friday, we started our road trip up to the north of the south island, Golden Bay and the Marlborough Sounds. Drove through the Lewis Pass, which was stunning,
Baby Rachael
This is the first calf Rach F delivered by herself, hence the name tag. She is beautiful and incredibly cute. Naturally. plus the sun was shining! Managed to pass through all large towns without buying food for dinner, only to arrive at our hostel for the night, 5 minutes after the 1 and only shop had shut. Neither of the cafe/restaurants open for business. So we had an interesting concoction of onions, cauliflower, veggie stock, cheese and pasta for tea. Mmmmmm. Thank goodness we had some chocolate for pudding.
In the morning we awoke to beautiful sunshine, lovely. Took a walk to the lake, mountains in the distance, picture postcard and all that. Quite a lot of sandflies hanging out there so didn't stay too long. Driving again, today heading up to Golden Bay and Farewell Spit. Stopped for lunch at the beautiful Kaiteriteri, at the base of the Abel Tasman National Park. Then followed a very, very windy, steep drive around to Golden Bay. Hairpin after hairpin. Wondered when they would end.
We eventually arrived in Collingwood (no nothing to do with that George Clooney film). Now you would have thought after yesterday's food debacle that we would have had the sense to buy food when we went passed a food retail outlet, knowing full well that we
would be spending the night in a very small place. Yet we chose to follow the Rough guide's lines of "Collingwood has a small shop", with great gusto and were fully confident that when we rolled up at 4pm on Saturday afternoon it would be open. It did however close at 2pm.
Obviously we hadn't taken the following into account when thinking about shop opening times in this part of the world. New Zealand only has 4.03 million people living in it. Only 800,000 of them live on the South Island and of that 435,000 live in the Greater Christchurch area. And so, when you consider the remaining land area of the South Island, the people are probably going to be spread quite thinly. And therefore, you would not expect 24hr supermarkets like you get in Guildford.
And this is where I'll end my laborious description of the past 6 days. Will fill you in on the rest in a couple of days.
And so this is the last NZ blog...sniff. Already planning our return visit!!
Love,
Rach & Rach & Jen xxxxxx
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Giles C
non-member comment
Hi
Fezza - goo to hear from you and interesting to find out that you have become a dairy farmer. Is the first step to becoming a chocaltier ? Take care, Giles