Autumnal Changes

Autumn is well underway.  There are beautiful colours before the leaves fall off the trees. The good weather has continued almost unbroken over Easter and it looks like it could stay like this for a bit longer. Of course the winters are mainly sunny anyway, it is just the temperatures that change. There have still been a few hot days but generally it is cool in the mornings and then up to the mid teens during the day. We have started to light the fire in the evening.

A week ago I started job number 9……..in the vineyard across the road, harvesting the grapes. It is a pleasant job out in the autumn sun. They don’t pick grapes when it rains, and you may not work every day as it depends on the winemaker, if he wants more or less grapes. You start at 8am and work to anything between 2.30 and 5.30. I cycle to work and it takes me 3 minutes (downhill) and 10 mins to get home. There are about 14 of us and different people come and go. Quite a few older people work there to earn money for holidays etc. You work in pairs, one on either side of the vine and walk as a group along the rows. You can listen to your own music etc. One person has a podcast to learn French while another is trying to learn Japanese, so you hear them saying phrases as you move along. There are conversations going on and generally there is a nice atmosphere. They also provide the Friday drinks of beer and wine (of course) at the end of the day. It is quite tiring and your back does ache by the end of the day. Unfortunately I go back to job number 3 next week so I may miss the rest of the harvest. I have got a week or 2 of teaching, and the harvest may finish this week (so I could miss out on getting the 2012 harvest t-shirt).

As we live in the sunniest place in New Zealand, we decided to get solar powered water heating installed. It is due to be switched on in the next couple of days.  Winter work mode will mean we don’t go to the wharf each day and we will get a chance to get lots of garden work done (as well as our paid employment). We intend for Wheelie Fantastic to do more group, corporate and conference work during the winter. We have just launched our full website, www.wheeliefantastic.co.nz and we need to add links and more photos to that. There is always admin etc to do, so we are never not busy.

The local agricultural freebie newspaper reported on a country show which took place recently. The article included a picture of a child jumping a log while holding an animal by its tail. It turned out to be a kids obstacle race which they did while carrying a dead possim!!

Mapua held its Easter fair on Easter Sunday. It was a massive affair and is allegedly the largest fair on the south island. Over 15000 people attended it and the roads into the village were gridlocked. There was a tailback on the main road from Nelson that went back for approx. 10km. We will not see that many people here for the rest of the year.

 Tomorrow(25^thApril) is ANZAC day, the commemoration of those who have died in wars. It is a public holiday with shops only allowed to open from 1pm to 6pm. Today there was a special assembly at school to mark ANZAC day. The kids were very respectful and it finished off with the national anthem sang in maori and then English. I was able to sing most of it!

 As we approach the end of April we are nearly at our one year anniversary of leaving Portrush. What a year. I look back at my 2011 diary and with sadness read about who we said goodbye to each day. I remember the feeling of excitement, sadness, adventure and exhaustion as I read about each day. This time last year I had just finished work. I looked at my little blue lunch bag, as it sat in the vineyard the other day, at morning tea break, and remembered how it used to sit in the staffroom at lunch time. Sometimes I feel like I am watching someone else’s story unfold. I can’t say I have got used to life without a regular salary, but as I have to prepare to teach next week, I can say I have got used to not teaching every day. I enjoy the diversity and scope of being self-employed. One year on and the adventure continues…….watch this space!

Autumn

Autumn has started with fab weather. The days still get into the low 20s, with plenty of sunshine but cooler mornings and evenings. We have had a couple of Autumn  arrivals. Lisa’s uncle Mike and Steph were here for 10 days and we have had a new window put into the kitchen, but the most exciting arrival was Snowy.  One morning, we woke up and looked out the window to see snow on the mountain tops and a small baby llama in our herd. We did suspect that a couple of the llamas were pregnant, but had no idea birth was imminent. We suspect one or two of the others could be due, but who knows when.  It was named Snowy and it is doing well and getting bigger by the day.  In this modern era of livestock management, we of course consulted the internet. It gave us lots of advice, none of which we could do! For example one breeder said that goat colostrum was a must. We phoned the owner and left a message. Four weeks later we still haven’t heard from him.

Snowy- 2 days old

Snowy, approx 3 days old

As the days get shorter (our clocks go back tonight), we are heading into a quieter phase for cycle hire. We have provided bikes for a few groups , with our biggest group needing 26 bikes! We seem to have been busier than any of the other bike companies in the area. 

One of our group bookings, bikes ready to go

 Easter is the last holiday before ‘winter’. Lisa will get more hours over winter in the restaurant and I will get relief teaching. To assist our income, I decided to give apple packing a go. I went to a packing shed down the road from our house. I worked 3 nights a week from 6pm to 10 pm (although I had meetings to go to so some weeks I did one or two nights) The work involved standing in one place and sorting apples onto cardboard trays, checking for the tiniest of flaws and then setting them on the tray, all facing the same way. It was quite physical in a funny kind of way. After a few weeks my wrists and hands were suffering, so after a discussion with a friend who is a nurse, we decided that it was not worth the risk of doing long-term damage to myself.  I think that was job number 8! Job number 9…..watch this space.

Speaking of jobs, I got 3 days of relief ‘teaching’. It involved going with about 90 16 year olds on their school camp. There where 9 staff, including me. We went to keiteriteri, for the base camp on the edge of the spectacular Able Tasman National Park. On day one I set off with a group of 11 girls to tramp (walk) to a camp site. We tramped for 4 hours and got to our little camp site in a tiny bay beside the sea.  The whole theme of the camp was about leadership and I was only there as an onlooker, as the group was organising itself. As it turned out, they worked well as a team and even though we had a couple of urbanites in the group, everything went well. We got to our site and they pitched their tents and cooked our meal.

One of the beautiful views along our tramping route - I was getting paid to work here!

                                                             The view from my 'tent' on night one

I don’t think UK kids would have coped as well.  It was just as well they didn’t need my help as I was having to sort out myself. I had been handed a ‘lightweight tent’ to take with me. When I went to pitch it I found that it wasn’t a tent but only a fly sheet, so I had to make it into a sort of a tent. I pitched it in a patch just beside the sea and went to sleep with the sound of gentle waves, and the rustling of something in the bushes !! I slept well and we were all ready to go by 7.30 the next morning when a water taxi came and picked us up. Back to base camp for day 2. I was then given the job of taking the mountain bike groups to the mountain bike park. Each group did 2 hours and we had 4 groups. Some of the kids were better than me and some couldn’t cycle very well at all. Nobody fell off, so that was OK. All this in the most beautiful settings and I was getting paid to be there. The second night was much more civilised with meals cooked for us and myself and another teacher shared a large tent with beds in it.

                                             Part of our civilised base camp

 I am going off next week on a geography field trip for 3 days, to Nelson lakes. We will be sleeping in a lodge and will have all our meals cooked for us.