Waikato

Every campsite is stunning. Here by the Waikato river, which is fed by Lake Taupo and in turn feeds the Huka Falls.

Tongariro Crossing

Woke up in the morning to this view of the volcano Ngauruhoe.

Then walked the Tongariro Crossing in about seven hours between several extinct volcano craters. Visible in the background is Ruapehu. Still active at times and there is a warning at the beginning of the track on how to avoid lava flows!

Lichen

Aliens

I remember reading about these amazing machines once a few years ago in the uk, but have only ever seen them here. Pretty surreal.

Working environment

When I was back in England last year desperately trying to visualise what it would be like to live and work in Wellington rather than London and England, I imagined working in these wooden houses on these hillsides, with these views and compared them with working in London flats overlooking the backside of Victorian tenements. And here I am, living the dream. God knows, it isn't for the money.

Product endorsement

I have had my tent for 18 years. I bought it 3rd hand from a vicar in Colorado Springs and it had RENTAL emblazoned all over it. Despite it's provenance, the manufacturers have been true to their warranty word and replaced 2-3 tent poles over the years and even made a couple of repairs to the fly. This winter I decided to send most of the tent back to them for an overhaul, but the fly was showing so much UV damage that they offered to sell me a new tent for half price since UV damage isn't covered by the warranty. So now, in the bat of an eyelid, I suddenly have a brand spanking new tent. Same model. New livery. Can withstand a hurricane up Mount Everest - which is pretty useless to me admittedly. I just like it because it is lightweight and spacious. If any of you want to invest in a quality product from a great company, go look at www.sierradesigns.com. Not cheap, but worth every cent.

Behind the tent, our lemon tree just never stops producing fruit.

Section

I have been looking at building plots to see what is available and how much they cost, and I found one in Roseneath - probably my favourite suburb in Wellington - which seems cheap compared to other "sections" on the market. Maybe because it is 100m off the road. But otherwise I can't explain it. It is high enough on the hillside to get a lot of sunlight - can be a problem in Welly - and low enough to feel close to the water. The fact that it is away from roads is a delight to me, although that may not be the case when trying to get building materials, furniture, firewood, shopping, etc. to a house! At the moment I am aware that it is covered in native bush, alive with bird song and has stupendous views up the bay.


In order to try and work out what I can fit on to the site, I have had to crawl up and down the hill, through the trees with camera and compass to try and work out the topography and boundaries. This is my guesstimate of what the section would look like naked.


And this is what I would like to build on it. Actually two houses. The bottom to sell. The top to house my furniture collection! To be continued.....

View

This is the view from my bedroom window. It is pretty much the same through all the seasons. All the indigenous trees are evergreen and the result is a landscape which never looks quite as dead in winter as a North European one. Here you can see mainly pohutukawa, which come from the north of the north island, but have been planted extensively here in Wellington, and Macrocarpa, which are a pine tree from California originally. However here they seem to grow to about three times the size they would reach in America. (If I ever build a house here I may use the timber from these trees as cladding. It weathers to a pleasant light grey colour.) In other places, notably the South Island, deciduous trees from Europe were planted by the original settlers wanting to recreate a home from home. There the sense of winter is much greater.

Also in view are the playing fields of Wellington College. Sport is pretty important here. Not surprising when you consider that a nation of 4 million people can regularly defeat the rest of the world in rugby. Although one should not forget that Polynesians (Maori and South Pacific Islanders) can be menmountains, and are a race with a bellicose history. The sports fields in the picture are often filled with kids playing rugby, football, hockey from dawn to dusk.
This may go some of the way to explaining why kids here seem pretty rounded and balanced people. Although teenagers display all the usual tribal trappings of youth, it seems to be largely without the associated angst and attitude that I associate with the age. This may be peculiar to Wellington. Gangs do exist and the NZ male teenage suicide rate is one of the highest in the world. But what I observe is an openess, confidence and lack of bullying and intimidation, that feels enlightened and refreshing. It possibly also results in a slightly less vibrant and eclectic culture than I have experienced in London, but there are plenty of local bands and artists out there to counter this view.
I just caught some kids nicking lemons off our lemon tree. Instead of scarpering, they came over and explained that they were making lemonade and could they have some lemons please? No fear. No shame. Just open. I figured there were enough to go around and why try and develop their sense of fear.
The other day a 13 year old said "Hi" to me as I was working on a friend's house. I'm so used to giggling, self-conscious, mini-skirt clad teenagers in England, I felt ashamed that I wasn't the one greeting her first.

Vege patch

This is my vegetable garden. From right to left we have rhubarb and mint, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, broad beans, assorted herbs and fennel, beetroot, cabbage and silverbeet (aka swiss chard). Beetroot and swiss chard both very common here. We have a new flattie moving in on the 7th July, who grew up on a market garden and is a keen gardener, so I am hoping my knowledge will increase exponentially.

Impermanence

I love this map of New Zealand. It shows clearly the dominant histories of this land mass. In it's current incarnation it hasn't had enough time to form a significant difference in the height of it's land mass above the height of the surrounding sea floor to show a shadow on the map. Whereas it has in a couple of earlier incarnations, which presumably lasted millions of years. The last was roughly similar in shape to the existing one, but a single land mass rather than two main islands. Before that it looks like the island was almost as big as India, with a huge river starting off the coast of Dunedin. I'm guessing that at this point in it's history it was attached to Australia and India as part of the supercontinent Pangaea.
You can also see the line where the Pacific and Astralian tectonic plates meet down the line of the Southern Alps in the South Island up through the middle of the North Island and into the South Pacific.
A taste of our insignificance in the grander scheme of things.

Forestry

Agriculture and forestry are New Zealand's two major businesses. Agriculture has been sustained for decades by large quantities of subsidised phosphates that have leached into most of the major lakes and water courses, threatening wildlife and further tarnishing the "Green" image. Forestry does provide the country - and world for that matter - with a huge carbon sink. ie it takes carbon atoms from CO2 emissions and locks them into wood tissue. It can unfortunately also be a blot on the landscape.

Heating

Where New Zealand falls down with it's "green" image is in urban areas. It is only green because of it's sparse population. Houses are under insulated and there are no central heating systems. Most houses have wood fired stoves as their primary source of heat. And oil filled electric radiators as their secondary. I sometimes wonder, insulation aside, whether the electric rads aren't actually greener than an oil/ gas fired central heating system given that they only heat the rooms that are occupied (rather than the whole house) and 65% of kiwi electricity comes from renewable resources.
This is our wood pile. We bought it a couple of months ago, when it looked like it was getting cold, then the weather changed it's mind and we're only just starting to get into it. And we are past mid-winter! Hooray. The sun still shines most days and it's warm enough to bake you in a sunroom, and make working outdoors comfortable. It rises at 7am and sets at 5pm. Hardly a winter at all. Until the wind moves around to the south!

Adolescent

More and more it strikes me that New Zealand is like a teenager. Through much of it's history it has been clinging like a needy child to the skirts of mother England or the USA in the fifties. Now it is beginning to rebel. Stick two fingers up at the US with it's no nuclear policies. And trying to find it's own identity. Like a teenage punk with it's mohican, New Zealand has branded itself with the fern leaf - either furled or open. They are everywhere. From corporate logos to manhole covers. In this sculpture exhibition by different artists, over half the exhibits portrayed the emblem.
To be honest, I love the adolescence although some of the self-consciousness and insecurity at an individual level can be painful to witness. There is a sense of idealism that is stifled in older civilisations by the weight of what has gone before. Whether it manifests itself in a progressive environmental policy, the aforementioned no nukes policy, or the recent adoption of proportional representation, it's a brave new world, but not as Huxley envisioned it.

Time Warp

In England lots of people who had travelled to New Zealand, described it to me as being like England twenty or thirty years ago. I used to feel quite protective of kiwis and would point to their environmental policies as a sign of how much more progressive they are. However, I have to admit that in many ways it is true. Products that have been withdrawn from sale in Europe decades ago, are still on sale here. I have never heard so much Dire Straits, Police, Kate Bush!? in my life since the eighties. There are good things about this too. Crime levels here are probably at the same level they were in England in the seventies. You can leave your front door unlocked and tools in your van, with little chance of having anything nicked.
This Chopper is mint. I was looking at it to see if it had been restored or was factory new. I never figured it out.

Van

Monday. I found this van in an auction locally. One careful owner from new. Full service history. Power steering. Alarm. Very clean and tidy. Wall to wall carpeting inside. Perfect for work and maybe a bit of travel sometime. So I bought it. Very scary minute or two. But I am now the proud owner and a whitevanman once again!

Sunday walks

Every weekend, I go for a walk. I try not to go more than ten minutes drive from where I live. And this is some of the scenery I get to enjoy.




Sunset

Party

We had a party to celebrate Sarah's (one of my flatmates' girlfriend) 35th birthday, Naomi's leaving for Berlin in a week, and a kind of housewarming for new flatmates like me. The theme was red. Here is Naomi strutting her stuff.

Donkey

I got down to Christchurch and found that the van I had bought with a pool of oil under the engine, a faulty indicator and a smoky engine. I decided to get out of the deal while I was still ahead. The seller was trying to convince me that the oil was from his neighbour'c car, when it obviously wasn't. I could have probably fixed the oil leak and resprayed it, but I didn't trust the engine. I don't think it was the original engine because one of the engine mounts was new, so the milage was anybody's guess. I should have guessed when the guy didn't call me during the auction as I requested, or take the photos I wanted to see. I assumed it was because he was foreign and didn't understand English that well, but it turns out to have been just a measure of my gullibility.

I had accepted an invitation to stay with an old friend of the family called Jenny, in Geraldine - about 2 hours drive down the road. I managed to catch a ride there in a minibus. New Zealand has this amazing network of minibuses and coaches that act rather like communal taxis. You can be picked up from your door and be delivered to any door at the destination.



Jenny kindly took me out for a trip into MacKenzie country the next day to see this beautiful scenery of big open plains covered in golden grasses and turquoise, glacial lakes with mountains as a backdrop. The water here passes through eight turbines in its journey down to the sea. Hydro electric schemes like this supply 65% of New Zealand's total electricity needs.

Transit

I seem to have just bought this van on the NZ equivalent of ebay. I've never seen it, let alone heard it running, so a bit of a gamble, but the price was right. It's in Christchurch, so it looks like another trip to the South Island is imminent. Friends are encouraging me to go on a bit of a road trip over the central grasslands featured in the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the Southern Alps, then up the West coast. I may be away for a while!

Feijoa crumble

New Zealand's climate seems to lend itself to growing just about everything. Somethings all year around. I have a friend up at the northeast corner of the country who owns an avocado farm. At the moment feijoa are coming into season, so I have just produced this fine kiwi dish, a feijoa crumble for my flatmates. What I like is that the food we eat here is determined by season far more than in England. I guess we are just too isolated to be flying green beans in from Kenya.

South Island

I have just been over to the South Island for a few days again. Back to the same area in the north of the island that I went before. The trip started off on the ferry in balmy weather, but I later got a few soakings going over some of the hills. On Thursday I visited the newly formed Centre for Fine Woodworking, run by an Englishman who trained at the same college as me in Oxfordshire. Nice to have a day of just talking wood with people who didn't think I was being boring!


On Friday I went to the "Naked Possum" shop to see if possums might make suitable coverings for my chairs. But the little critters are just too small. Very soft though. And yes I do see the irony of a vegetarian using animal skins, but the (human) kiwis are determined to kill them to help the (avian) kiwis and other flightless New Zealand birds survive.


Following this I went for a walk at Farewell Spit - a huge sand bank that curls around the northern tip of the South Island. I thought it might remind me of Wells beach in North Norfolk. And it did, although the scale of sand and dunes was even larger than there. The obvious question to ask here is, Why travel halfway around the world just to seek out a beach that reminds you of home? And I don't know the answer to that one.
I finished my weekend off doing a yoga course at a spa resort nearby owned by a couple of Germans. Did wonders for my sirsasana and parivritta janu sirsasana.

Trouble ahead

There may be trouble ahead. I've just discovered that my local bottle shop (tr. off-license) sells beer on tap. Obviously, in the interests of the environment/ recycling bottles, this is a service I have to use. Unfortunately the smallest measure is over 2 pints/ 1.25 litres and it has to be drunk once opened!

Kitchen

I've been tinkering with the kitchen of the house where I am living.
Before


And after

Jo and Paddy

I mentioned Jo earlier in this blog. I know Jo from London squatting days, but she is now married to a kiwi called Aaron and works for a cabinet minister. Nice for me to have a familar face here in Wellington. She is shown here with her rather laid back Irish wolfhound, Paddy Collins Jr.

Bread

Just baked my first loaves in the new house. Some of the best ciabatta I have ever made, despite having to use a very old gas cooker with a leaky door. Very chuffed.

Satellite pic

This is the satellite view of New Zealand today. Another fine day in Wellington (although we did have a load of rain yesterday evening.)

Made me wonder where the equivalent in the northern hemisphere would be. The answer? Just west of Valladolid.

Swan plant

Should just point out that the swan plant featured below under "Monarch butterfly" is so called because of it's fruit. Can you see it?

Golden Bay

The track ends in Golden Bay. I spent a couple more days in the area exploring the beautiful landscape before returning to Wellington and a new home.

Abel Tasman track

Just been in the north of the South Island for a week, which involves catching the ferry from Wellington to Picton. I hooked up with my friend Kaya, who I last saw in Gokarna, India a couple of months ago, and went tramping for 4 days and nights along the Abel Tasman track. One of NZ's nine Great Walks, it is mainly coastal path, with some bits of native bush in between bays.




Native bush usually has a high percentage of ferns in it, including tree ferns - or ponga (pronounced punga) - amongst the southern beeches and manuka trees. This makes it feel pretty primordial. Why? I guess because all the artists impressions one sees of dinosaurs include ferns. They are known to be one of the oldest forms of plant life still in existence.

The manuka trees remind me of tamarisk trees in Greece.

One of our campsites.

I was dreading this. Kaya loves feeding all of god's creatures..... especially the cute ones..... ..... and possums love being fed, and are cute, and are a real pest around campsites. One of them actually tore a hole in the side of my tent to get at my scroggin one night. So perhaps you can understand why I really didn't want Kaya to meet one. But whaddayaknow....

Oh yeah! Scroggin. Kiwi for a high energy mix of chocolate, nuts, dried fruits and seeds. This was a particularly deluxe mix of my own creation.