The Land of the Long White Cloud

Before getting to New Zealand we had two good days in Sydney, with our Couch Surf hosts Stephen and his daughter Cassie, before we left.  They looked after us really well, including taking us around a few places including Circular Quay where the iconic Sydney Opera house is and also on the ferry to Manly for a visit to the beach, where guess what, yes, Megan wanted had a swim, there’s a surprise!

The second day there we found found ourselves on a ferry again and visiting Cockatoo Island.  This is an old penal colony and later a shipyard; it built ships for the Australian Navy right into the eighties.  Now it is a developing visitor attraction, with tours with differing subjects and lengths also various activities, recently a centre for street art, it also has a campsite with tents already set up and a swimming place, all this within sight of Sydney Harbour Bridge. 

Street Art Festival

So onto New Zealand, we are staying with Megan’s cousin Graham and his wife Sarah, they have two young children, Amy (6) and Henry (nearly 5).  The house is set in 20 acres of prime farmland, and apart from the odd strange tree and bird, it looks just like the border of England and Wales somewhere round Hereford, which happens to be where they come from!  They have a few sheep and cows, some of whom now reside in the freezer, some chickens and Grahams first love – a tractor, John Deere of course, and some machinery to help him with hay making.  He works full time for the local John Deere dealer as a fitter and service engineer, travelling around the area visiting local farmers and repairing their machines.  Sarah works at the doctors, very handy when you need to get a prescription written.

Megan on the fishing trip

The first thing we noticed was how much colder it is here, south of Christchurch, on the South Island, we had to visit a second hand clothing store to buy some warmer clothes!  Hopefully as we move north from here it will get warmer again, one advantage the biting insects have been left behind leaving Meg in peace.

Look What I Caught

I caught one as well

Last Sunday we went on a Mega Fishing Trip, up into the High country with Graham and his friend Neville who is a New Zealand version of Johnny Kingdom (see the BBC) every time we stopped we caught some fish, most of them large and all edible, some small but thrown back – a few of those would have found their way into the ‘bag’ in the UK.  Neville’s local knowledge was incredible, first we went to a ‘canal’, a man made waterway running out of Lake Tekapo and an amazing blue colour. This water passes through 7 or 8 hydro-electric generation stations on its way to the sea, making the most of its kinetic energy.  In one part of the canal there is a salmon farm and we went there to catch ‘escapees’ and we did, 2 each, our allowed catch, they were about 4-6 lbs and very tasty indeed.  Then an hours drive, some of it through 4 wheel drive country, to a river.  Neville got out of the car, grabbed his ‘trout rod’ thrust a worm on the hook, strode up to the bank cast his fishing buddy (the worm) into the fast moving water, waited for about a minute, shook his head, reeled it in, moved 2 metres to his right cast again and in less than 15 seconds hooked fish, handed me the rod a said ‘land that’, which I did, a magnificent 3lb brown trout, how about that then for local knowledge?  We caught and kept nearly our allowance of 2 each, we got 7, so 15 fish in total Neville only wanted one so the rest were taken home to consume in various ways, I will say the brown trout were particularly good, in my opinion. 

Graham with one of his

Tackling Up

Brown Trout

Apart from the fishing on that day, the scenery we were in was spectacular; I know I’ve used that descriptive term before a few times writing this blog, but each time it has warranted it’s use and they all still do.  New Zealand really is Aotearoa – The Land of the Long White Cloud.

The Road Home

Goodbye Australia, for now.

Sea Baths, Newcastle

The moral of this latest story is talk to your host and, as a good Scout, ‘Be Prepared’.  The ‘Little Yellow Beauty’ took us on the last leg from Newcastle to Kooloombakh (Kevin’s farm near Taree) without any mishaps, and there we finally parted.  When we first contacted Kevin we asked for about 2 weeks volunteering, but as we had not talked for a while when we arrived he was in ‘Summer Holiday’ mode and had very little work for us,  we helped for a few days, during which it rained nearly all the time.  Megan’s sewing skills were once again in demand, making curtains and cushion covers for one of his ‘helper’ caravans and I tidied a shed, but what a shed, a veritable Aladdin’s cave.  We then hastily arranged and moved on to another Helpx at Repton to help Leigh and Liz, two artists, with some jobs, cleaning the pool for me (again) and Meg general stuff and we are now house sitting for them for a few days, before couch surfing in Sydney for 3 nights.

Swimming in the 'Bogie Hole'

A bit 'Pythonesque!'

Our latest visit to Australia has reinforced our opinion of the country, the feeling of lots of space; you don’t feel the pressure of a large population like you do at home in the UK.  This manifests itself in many ways; the space on the roads when you move away from the cities, the places to stop for a picnic without jostling for a table, much less litter and overflowing bins.  

Barney looking out at the world

 After 'The Crossing'

Station Wait

In general the people here have a ‘can do’ attitude, as opposed to the finding any excuse for ‘not doing‘.  On the TV people have been interviewed during the latest flooding in north NSW and south Queensland and they just except and clean up without waiting for help.  A farmer with most of his land under water and his stock moved (days of toil) to higher ground just shrugged and said the water would help the grass grow.  Some of these people were flooded only last year in what was supposed to be ‘once in a lifetime’.

Sub Tropical rain forest

We have seen more of the country, driving west to east was fantastic and we run out of superlatives to describe it, meeting old and new friends, as well making more new ones along the way, we are going to need another year to visit all these people across the world we have become friends with.

Mylstom Beach

So now, New Zealand here we come, first we visit Megan’s cousin, Graham and his wife Sarah and their two children, Amy and Henry, then another Helpx near Nelson.  I still need a card for my Valentine.  I wasn’t going to bother! (Megan’s Comment).

View from a hilltop on Kevin's farm