Slacker Blogger!

Yes, I have been a slacker blogger. But I've been on vacation doing a lot of fun things! I haven't had time to blog.... We've been in Queenstown for the last 2.5 weeks. We arrived from Dunedin, parked our caravan in the only caravan park that we have found that recycles almost everything AND has vermicomposting! Very exciting. As soon as we settled into our new home we started exploring. Queenstown in renowned for its mountain biking so Marc has been spending every second morning biking to the top of the mountain in town and hurtling himself and his bike off of it. I'm sure that he actually just rolls down very quickly with style and grace, banking curves and clearing jumps with speed and skill, but I don't know, I'm not that kinda gal so I've never seen him do it. I joke that he SAYS that he's going mountain biking but really just heads off to have a nap somewhere or attempts to pick up young tourist girls. Before Marc heads off to bike down mountains (or have a nap and eat ice cream), he drops me off in a nearby town named Arrowtown. The very clever local council here has realized that while there are plenty of high adrenaline tourists and locals who enjoy higher risk speedy sports, maybe their partners/parents/children do not. So they built over 150kms of wonderful biking and walking trails in the area. They built suspension bridges over the gorges to link the trails up, underpasses under the highways to that timid riders, tourists and kids alike can all cross without playing frogger. Since it opened up a year ago they estimate that 100 thousand people have used the trails. They weren't cheap to build, costing millions of dollars. 2 purpose build suspension bridges, 3 underpasses, 7 regular bridges, and lots of excellent trail that has to be maintained. But they realize the value of having a place for locals to stay fit, and having a dedicated trail system to keep cyclists safe and heading to local businesses to buy things. Most days when Marc heads out cycling so do I. I can cover about 35 k in 3 hours, this usually includes huffing and puffing up various steep hills, cruising down the other side, stopping to wash my face in the cold blue river, using one of the toilet facilities on route, and checking out the beautiful landscape. It's all really so much better on a bike than in a car. Marc came with me one day and we cycled from Arrowtown to the Gibston valley wineries for an afternoon of wine tasting and tours before heading back. This trail is one of the reasons that we've stayed here so long. I have something super fun to do while Marc is mountain biking. So other than cycling and getting sore bums, we've been fishing. We've driven the road up to Glanorchy a few times. A beautiful winding 45 kms along lake Wakatipu with mountain ranges in the back ground. We stop along scenic areas and pull out the rods and cast until we get sick of the views or the blackflies, then move on. We must have fished for a total of 20 continuous hours so far this trip. And not one fish. Last year we caught several fish in November and December in river runs. Apparently at this time of year, mid summer, the fish have all moved into the deeper lakes and so boatless people like ourselves have to take our rather poor chances casting from shore. But it's such a great excuse to make so many trips to strange places. We'll pick a lake in the middle of nowhere on a map, pack a picnic and head out to see if we can catch any fish. Along the way we see new scenery, stop in to new grocery stores etc, then we arrive in this spectacular location where we have the excuse to hang out for several hours as we are "fishing". The latest fabulous place we headed to was Mavora lakes where we also found "Fangorn forest" from the lord of the rings movies. A few days ago we took a trip out to near Clyde to cycle a section of the central Otago rail trail. We cycled for 35k, crossing several old bridges and passing through two loooong dark tunnels. Info panels and old ruins to get a history fix along the way. I love how small towns keep going here. Until the 1980's the government kept the rail lines going by putting limits on how far goods could travel on the roads. Once these restrictions came down, the rail line....and those towns whose life blood was the rail line, were defunct. So the rails were ripped up. And did you see these small towns, some as small as population 25 people, whine, moan and beg the government for a handout? Nope, they started the central Otago rail trail trust, fund raised millions of dollars, and partnered with the Department of Conservation to build a cycling experience from the old rail trail. Now, about 80thousand people cycle or walk on the trail every year. These small dwindling towns, they have had to convert their schools, old police stations, and empty homes into lodging, hotels, B+B's and cafe's to accommodate the cyclists who pass though spending money each year. Very cool On the way home from our cycling day, we stopped in at the old Hayes engineering work and got to check out the shop and homes of Mr Hayes who invented many agricultural tools that we still use today, like fence wire tensioners and the like. Marc spent at least an hour in the shop figuring out how the windmill would have powered all of the equipment there. The old building, over 100 years old and still sound, were build of sun baked clay bricks. All really neat. Then on to the tiny town of St. Bathans, an old gold mining town, for a pint and a snoop around the landscape, dramatically changed by sluicing during the gold rush. I also got bragging rites in St Bathans as I spotted a New Zealand Falcon in a tree. Being married to a birder, it gives me some pretty hefty street cred to have spotted a rare bird before Marc. We've been filling in the gaps with cherry picking (5kgs each time...the last place that we were at, the scottish owner asked us if we would like a roll of toilet paper with our cherries), wine tasting, a few music concerts, day hikes, and today we're going to snoop around some open houses to see if we can glean any ideas for our own construction at home. Big hugs to all, see you in late Feb Erin and Marc

Our little home in the country.....of New Zealand

I just received an email from my friend Jill asking to remind her of this blog address so that she can follow along in our travels this year. Oops, I guess that I had better get writing if I want to share the blogspot! Unlike last year where Marc and I spent the first 2 weeks of our trip shopping for and looking at, then buying and kitting out a caravan (camper in Canadian English) and truck (truck in Canadian English), this year we just showed up, picked up our truck and caravan, and moved back into our little country house. I love Chunk and Mani (yes I named our truck and caravan). I love the freedom that they give us to move where our home is whenever we want, I love how they solidify the fact the notion that less is more. Only 125 square feet of living space, and Marc and I never feel that we are wanting for anything while on vacation in Mani. So this year, we parked in the Christchurch caravan park for 5 days while we sorted our insurance, got some groceries, and hung out with Eric and Sue and my niece and nephew. It's amazing the difference that a year makes. Last year my nephew was having a terrible toddler year, this year, he's all grown out of being a jerky toddler, and is all grown into being a brutally honest 5 year old. Seems like semantics I'm sure, but a brutally honest 5 year old is funny and fun to be around, a jerky toddler is, well, neither of the aforementioned. We went cherry picking with the kids and my folks, an incredible amount of fun, especially being able to pick with Eleanor who is just as crazy about cherries as I am, but much messier and therefore worse at hiding the evidence of the unpaid for cherries that went down the hatch before we hit the scale in the sales area.... The 6 of us headed to Orana wildlife park, a beautiful huge zoo where Marc and I opted to pay extra to go into the lion feeding cage at meal time. We stepped into the back of a truck that is caged off. The truck drives through the lion acreage and keepers push pieces of meat through the grid in the cage. This means that the 6 lions stalk the cage, jumping and snarling their big lion sounds. They jump on the cage and pace just 18 inches above our heads, growling, demanding more food....and letting us know just how much we look like food. I've done this 'ride' before but it was Marc's first. I loved how his eyes got soooo big. They are amazing animals to be that close to. We hit the farmers market at the port and headed off to an Agricultural and Pastoral show in a little town nearby. We got our fill of horse jumping etc. Then, off to Oamaru! An old victorian town build of the local lime stone. The town has plenty of history to explore, as well as colonies of little blue and yellow eyed penguins. We spent some time tracking them down and one very early morning got to a private sanctuary in time to watch 11 rare yellow eyed penguins wake up, sing their crazy songs, then waddle down hill and over a rock beach to the ocean to head off for the day's fishing. Very cool. We explored geological formations in the area, went to fossil museums, explored the art galleries (steam punk is very big in Oamaru) learned about the history of refrigerated meat in NZ and ate lots of good food. And we also saw cheese being made at a cheese shop. Every time that I travel here, I marvel at the HUNDREDS of little cheese shops, craft breweries, vineyards, locally produced cured sausages, clothing made with local wool, great restaurants, bakeries etc etc. Agriculture here is the antipodes of agriculture in Manitoba. The south island of New Zealand has the same land mass and the same population as Manitoba. Yet agriculture here in NZ is not based on commodity pricing. You don't see fields of wheat grown for a price per bushel. You see specialty bakeries selling bread for $6 a loaf. You don't see and smell massive hog barns that sell on a worldwide commodity hot hanging weight price that farmers go bankrupt on. You see sheds with freely run hogs and packages in EVERY store that say "New Zealand Free Farmed Pork" "100% New Zealand Pork" It's more expensive than the nondescript from who knows where pork of questionable quality and animal health standards that is sold right beside it in the same cooler. But the 2 products can coexist as farmers here are innovative enough to see a market need and work COOPERATIVELY to fill it! The same happens in almost every industry. You can buy regular milk and organic milk at all stores, and raw milk at designated areas. Near Christchurch there is Barry's Bay cheese, in Oamaru it's Whitestone cheese, in Dunedin it's evansdale cheese. And you can find all of these cheeses in large grocery stores! The ag industry here makes my heart light at the massive potential that Manitoba farmers have yet to tap. We just need a slight shift for it to happen. Ok, rant over. We're now in Dunedin, Edinburgh of New Zealand. We've been skunked at fishing, spent a rainy day in the very cool settlers museum, have wandered the beautiful old buildings and churches, have a jog every morning on the beautiful beach, and have taken a trip on the Taieri gorge train. I also spent 3 hours and WAY too much money at the Saturday farmers market. The Otago farmers market is one to behold. Food only, no t shirts or other nick nackery. It is a Farmers market, not a flea market or craft sale. Coffee is on hand, vendors can tell you long tales of all of their wares be they cheese, meat, sausage, specific varieties of plums, apricots, cherries, raspberries. There is a mobile kitchen where a top chef comes early, grabs from the wares, makes a menu from the items, prints of recipes and starts cooking so that everyone can see how to make it happen in your own kitchen. We bought a hot sauce that I will be trying to replicate at home. Pure bliss. We've also taken lots of drives out of town, chasing down fishing spots, finding a beautiful wetland sanctuary, and touring the resident Albatross colony (Marc was in bird photography heaven), as well as the Orokonui sanctuary. The sanctuary is acres and acres of fenced in native bush where all pest invaders like possums, rats, stoats, mice and weasels have been decimated. Then the rare native birds were re introduced. We saw 15 varieties of birds, photos will surely be on facebook and flickr in short order as Marc clicked away for hours. It was an amazing place. Tomorrow we head off for Queenstown. Land of hiking, biking, fishing, and crazy adventure sports. Wear good clothes and stay warm in Winnipeg! Erin

Back from the backcountry

We are still in Wanaka (rhymes with Chanukah)and still loving it here. We've headed out for lots of fishing in the area (no luck), spent a whole day at the Rippon Music festival where we saw some amazing acts and headed out for a day hiking up to the Rob Roy glacier. A beautiful 3 hour hike up a sheer cliff valley, culminating in views of the most awesome Rob Roy glacier, waterfalls running down the stone cliffs below it, Kea (alpine parrots) circling overhead. Just amazing. Marc felt especially fortunate as a Kea flew right down to within 3 feet of us, sat on the rock where we were having lunch, turned his head sideways to see what we might have of interest, and proceeded to peck at Marc's camera bag with his big curved beak. All the while Marc was snapping photos and talking his bird talk to our Kea. Very cool.

Scientists suspect that these birds became super intelligent during the ice age as a survival strategy. They are believed to have the same intelligence as some higher functioning primates, and it shows!! In some hiking areas, local Kea have made a game of stealing hikers boots during the night and throwing them off the edge of a cliff, they will team up to drag a cooler full of food of the edge of a deck so that it will break open and they can feast, and they have even learned how to use door latches, once even locking alpine climbers into their bunk hut forcing them to climb out the window in the morning.
The Department of Conservation has many stoat and weasel trapping programs. Stoats and weasels were introduced years ago in the hopes that they would take care of the introduced rabbit overpopulation. Turns out that the native birds like Kea and Kiwi are easier to catch and eat than rabbits. So now DOC is trying to kill off all of the stoats and weasels. They put out traps that are a wooden box, with a closed screen on one side where you can look in and see a yummy egg on a holder yummmmm, thinks the stoat, eggs!! Then the stoat enters the opening on the other side to get to the egg, the trap is sprung and the stoat has its neck broken in quick order, no muss no fuss. This trapping is really helping to increase bird populations where the program takes place. Until now that is. Recently Keas have figured out how to snitch the egg from the traps. They pick up the heavy trap, toss them around until the egg falls from its cradle and breaks, then they eat the broken egg through the screen. We also noticed sprung traps on our hikes with a stick in the trap, and the egg gone. Tricky Kea. DOC will have to find a way to outsmart the Kea on this one.


Yesterday evening we got back 'home' from a 3 night 4 day hike over Gillespy's pass. We chose to start the hike off with a jetboat ride up to the head of the trail, a very thrilling way to start the adventure. 4 hours of hiking uphill (we huffed and puffed as we have become surprisingly out of shape this past month) lead us to the sibera hut. The hut system here is just brilliant. You purchase hut passes (15 bucks per person per night) hike up to the hut that you choose, claim a mattress in a dorm room, stash your stuff in a cubby, and you are set. The huts provide clean bunks, a cooking area where you can use your camp stove without any wind or black flies nipping at you, evaporative toilets, sinks to wash your dishes, and there is almost always a river near by to bath in. Much nicer than lugging a tent and thermarest then spending your afternoon and evening hiding in your tent from the sand flies.

So, we hiked up to sibera hut, spent the night chatting with an English couple who was also at the hut then headed off to bed nice and early.
Day 2! We got to leave the packs behind as we just headed up to crucible lake, a 3 hour up a mountain day hike. On the way to the glacier fed lake I spotted some rock wren, a very rare alpine bird, Marc took lots of photos. We'll forward them to DOC who likes to hear about sightings of such things. On to the lake. It was beautiful. At the base of a glacier, the lake was filled with small (the size of a car or truck) icebergs. Very cool. As we sat at the side of the lake having lunch, one of the iceberg's submerged section broke off from the top, it sprung up to the surface creating waves over the whole lake. Then both the now separate top and bottom parts bobbed and weaved as they found their equilibrium in the water. Very cool.
Back to a very full hut as a tour group had flown in during the day.
Day 3. Up early and out the door as quick as we could as today is cross the pass day. I could get into painful detail but basically the day went like this, climb up through beech forest, climb, sweat, climb climb scramble, climb, grunt, sweat, climb up rocky tussock hills, groan, climb (repeat for 4 - 5 hours), sit on the top of a huge mountain, look around in awe. Down, down, down the tussock rocky area, jar the knees, down, down, slip, scramble, down, climb over boulders, whine (that was me, not Marc), down beech forest, arrive at Young hut, dump our stuff, take a wonderful bath in glacially cold water. Sit on deck of young hut eating instant mashed potatoes looking at the amazing surrounds.
Day 4. Head out again for a day of less steep downward hiking and out an amazingly beautiful river valley filled with beech forest, ford a river to get to the highway. What an amazing 4 day hike. I love how a shower feels just SOOOO good after spending some time in the beautiful back country.

So now we're back in Wanaka. We have to report in to the DOC office as you leave your hiking intentions there upon your departure, and let them know when you return. If you don't do this they send out a search party for you.

Marc would like to get some more mountain biking in while we are here, and there are lots of historic sights that I would like for us to visit while here too. We'll be sticking around the Wanaka area until we head back to Christchurch on the 18th. So much to see and do everywhere here. It's just brilliant really.

Big hugs to all!
Erin n Marc

Having too much fun to write

Really, we're having too much fun to spend much time on the computer, but since by 80something year old Grandma Hacault has recently become internet savvy for the first time, an is reading my blog, I have to write to keep her interested....Hi Grandma!!

After our fun times in Picton (which included a day of fishing where I caught BOTH Marc and my lunches), we headed back to Christchurch just in time for the buskers festival and to spend some more time with the family.
Every year Christchurch hosts an international buskers festival. The city flies in dozens of acts from around the world, and they spend 10 days busking at specific times at specific places. You get a guide, follow the fun and start ticking acts off as you see them. You can run around during the day, entry is free but clearly the buskers are only paid if you dish out so $5 per person is considered an acceptable fee for watching their half hour show. For people who can't make it out during the day, a night stage is set up and 6 acts each night perform to a packed crowd. The performers always pull hapless audience members on stage to "help" in the act. Marc must look like a prime target as he got dragged on stage 4 times during our festival visits. Very fun
We also bought tickets to some special night shows, the "boy with tape on his face" had us in tears with our faces sore from laughing and the "buskers burlesque" brought the art of seduction to a crowd who cat called their approval. Very well attended event, very professionally organized, very fun. It would be nice if Winnipeg could get a few more things going to attract people to our fair city in the summer.

After a week in Christchurch, back on the road to lake Tekapo! But wait, first a flat tire on the caravan that we had to spend several hours getting sorted...then...On the road to lake Tekapo!

About a 3 hour drive from Christchurch, Tekapo and the surrounding lakes are a beautiful milky blue colour. The glaciers that created these lakes many thousands of years ago also created "rock flour". These micro particles of glacially ground rocks are suspended in the water and reflect light in a way to make the water a spectacularly milky blue. Very pretty.
Because of the usual clear skies and lack of light pollution here, the university of Canterbury has an observatory on top of a mountain in the area. Marc and I took a night tour. Departing at what was usually our bed time, up the hill our bus chugged at 10:30 at night, to meet our guides who would be setting different telescopes on to different stars and constellations throughout the night. I loved it. Once you start looking at things, realizing that some of what we were looking at were over ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND light years away. The light shining from some of these stars and far away galaxies is over 100 000 years old. Amazing. Makes you feel completely insignificant. As I marveled at what I was seeing in the telescopes Marc was trained on his camera. An astrophotographer was out showing those camera geeks like Marc how to better photograph the night sky. I listened in for a bit of what the fellow was saying, it sounded a bit like the "Wa Wa Wa" tuba noise that the teachers on the Charlie Brown cartoons made, but Marc was paying rapt attention. He had a blast and didn't put his eye to a single telescope. A fabulous night.
We had planned to head off to Wanaka today, but gale force winds were on the forecast for the day, so rather than fight with a caravan on a windy road, we delayed the trip, and spent the day out at Mt. Cook park. We hiked along the bases of monstrous mountains shrouded in cloud and to a lake littered with ice bergs newly calved from the Tasman glacier. A great day.

Tomorrow, (wind permitting), we'll be back on the road to Wanaka, where we'll settle in for some hiking, mountain biking, fishing, and the Rippon music festival.

Cheers
Erin

Picton and its beautiful surrounds

I love our little caravan!

We just spent 3 nights, 4 days on the far tip of the Queen Charlotte track at a private reserve. The owner there, Ron, used to be a sheep farmer, then made the decision to take off the sheep, and let the native bush grow back. He opened up a lodge for people like Marc and I, and sells his carbon credits as offsets for businesses who want to claim to be carbon neutral. Very interesting fellow.

Marc and I got an 1.5 hour long boat ride to the lodge in the midst of heavy wind and rain. Luckily days 2, 3 and 4 were filled with bright sunshiny skies to offset the gale force winds. We spent our time hiking to old gold mining sites, visited a bay filled with green lipped mussels, hiked up to a lighthouse at the very tip of the peninsula of land. We had to walk on a section of track just meters across, with drops down to the ocean below. I wonder how long it will take for nature to cut that particular piece of land off from the rest and form yet another island in the area.

Marc and I were the only guests at the lodge during our stay so got to enjoy lots of chats with Ron and his WWOOFer Vero, a French girl who was volunteering for a month. Very fun.

We grabbed the boat back to Picton and out "home". So nice to come back to all of your things in one place as you left them, with no need to find a hotel room. I think that we're kind of hooked on this style of travel. There is no going back.

Today Marc and I headed off to the incredible aviation museum in Blenheim. A warehouse filled with restored and reproduced WW1 planes, tons of information, and life sized dioramas made up by Weta Workshops in NZ. They so lots of special effects and props for movies, including the Lord of the Rings trilogy. This was no grade school diorama project. We spent FOUR HOURS in the museum. Really it was amazing.

A stop off to pick a kilo of raspberries on the way home, and to check out some more food production places, then back home, to our caravan.


Tomorrow....mountain biking!
Keep warm!

Setting off again

After spending a week in Nelson, Marc and I headed up further north to the golden bay area. Land of hippies the town smells on incense and patchouli. Sadly, while in town we did not participate in any sit ins.

We only had a 6 days in Takaka so felt short of time right upon arrival. The area is so beautiful and there are so many things to see and do, we're already planning to spend much more time in this area next year.

We spent our week in Takaka fishing in the Cob valley, visiting some absolutely amazing fresh water springs, hiking up to lake Sylvester in the Kahuragi national park and Marc got a shuttle up to Cannan Downs bike park where he got to scratch his mountain biking itch heading down the Ramaka track for the day.

We also found the time to hike up to some local caves. The area is mostly limestone and marble, making huge caves in the hills a common thing. We hiked to one only a few kilometers from our camp ground, a vast opening in the side of the mountain ringed with stalactites that looked like a monster's teeth. Very cool. We also headed to Harewood's hole, a cave with a diameter of 50 meters at the top and a chimney that goes down 167 meters!!!! Water used to cascade down it to an underground cave/waterway system. The tunnel is now dry though as fissures higher up have opened up over the years, meaning that the water flowing downhill hits a fissure sooner than at Harewood's. It was incredibly spooky to hike up to it. We were already part way down at the view point with limestone cliffs soaring overhead, and an ominous dark void of a drop below. Very impressive. We were VERY careful not to get too close to the edge.

Marc and I spent a day hiking and biking around the farewell spit area. The spit is ever growing and currently is a whopping 26 km long. The area is a bird sanctuary and is home to thousands of migratory waders who pop in on their way to and from their other homes. Unfortunately, it is also the site of numerous pilot whale beachings every summer. The sand spit renders their sonar guidance systems near useless as the poor beasts plow into the sand. Local volunteers turn up in droves to help float the whales back out to sea.

It's amazing how quickly a week touring around goes!

Now we are all set up in Picton, a small town in the Marlborough sounds. We spent today taking a scenic drive up the coast, checking out lots of little bays and inlets. Popped in at a cherry orchard to binge on the last of this year's cherries ($9 per pound straight from the orchard, I love how farmers here charge enough to actually attempt to make a living!!) We went on an amazing wine tour learning about the inner workings of a large winery, tastings included...yum... And as luck would have it we found a hydroponic strawberry farm where we stopped, picked a small basket of berries, and chatted with the growers for half an hour about their experience with the business. Very fun....very fiber filled. Thank goodness Marc and I will be outside all day long tomorrow hiking on the north section of the Queen Charlotte Track. We'll be spending 3 nights at a lodge on a private reserve on the northern tip of a section of the sounds hiking, swimming if the sun is out, and hopefully we'll get a kayak trip in too.

Hope that all is well in Winnipeg!!!

Erin

shakey Crhistmas!

Everyone was in the house on the 23rd, getting ready for guests who Eric and Sue had invited over for a Christmas supper when, bang bang bang, a 6.0 earthquake happened whose epicenter was TWO blocks away from Eric and Sue's house. Just a few broken wine glasses and a tea pot bit the biscuit, and the swimming pool sloshed a bit. Mom and I stayed outside with the kids through the next few aftershocks while the rest of the crew cleaned up the mess. Our caravan was totally unharmed as we have virtually nothing breakable in it anyway. On with the dinner party. We moved the tables outside as evacuating a house full would be a challenge should another bump hit, and we had our party in the sunshine. Very picturesque.

We spent until the 28th in Christchurch, riding our bikes, Marc and I took a drive out to see castle hill near Arthur's pass. The area is filled with green rolling hills that have magnificent limestone monoliths sticking out of them. Pretty impressive. The whole family took a day hike out to washpen falls. Ira, almost 4 years old, walked the whole 4 hour route before finally crashing at the end. We all did, but of course it was most impressive that a 4 year old did it. Beautiful scenery all around. Mom, Dad Marc and I stopped in at lake Coleridge, a beautiful teal blue lake surrounded by mountains. It's used to produce hydro electricity. Marc and I dragged out the fishing rods and caught absolutely nothing, but the views were just spectacular.

On the 28th, we all packed up and headed off for Nelson, at the top of the North island. Known as the sunshine coast, Nelson had just come out of some pretty devastating rain when we arrived. Roads had been washed out, some people had lost their homes due to flooding etc. We arrived in sunshine, and would enjoy it for almost a full 24 hours before the rains hit again. Luckily, there are lots of museums, wineries and breweries in town (this is the hops and grape capital of NZ). So no worries, we kept ourselves occupied. With new years, a jazz festival, the World of Wearable arts museums etc, we were well entertained. Eric, Sue, Mom Dad and the kids headed back to Christchurch today and Marc and I headed out for a nice long day hike on a gloriously sunny day. Hopefully the rains have gone for the next little while.

Tomorrow, up to near the hippy town of Takaka!