Sheepdogs

Sheep, sheep and more sheep. New Zealand raises lots of sheep, for food, for wool, and for Merino wool. We saw lots of sheep, but we did not get to see many working sheepdogs, though that may come in the next few days. Sheepdogs are so important in New Zealand, however, that I suspect they would be considered excellent farmers! And they are so important that we went to a Monument to the Sheepdog, which is near to the Church of the Good Shepherd. It was a beautiful place!

Farming in New Zealand

Driving through Canterbury to go to Mt. Cook, we had the privilege of seeing many farms - big and small. Canterbury is much like Kansas in that it is flat and fairly dry. Their "sod" is a plant called tussock, which is difficult to cut through but it saves the soil. After a fire, they come back rather rapidly, nice and green, but as they mature they turn brown and only the new growth is green.

They call their fields paddocks, and they portion off the paddocks into smaller areas to graze their animals. When that area has been grazed enough, they move their animals to another portioned off area. New Zealanders take credit for inventing the electric fence, which started when a man bought a new car and his pal, Joe the horse, was none too fond of it. Using the car battery, the man arranged an electric wire to shock the horse when he pulled near to the car. We found the most interesting thing to be, however, the hedge rows. In Kansas, our hedge rows are a mess of cedars, osage orange, elm, and other trees, creating a bramble that is functional but ugly. We noticed that the hedge rows here look like this:

We are not sure what kind of machine they use to trim them so nearly, but it makes their farms look quite neat. The farmers also have center pivot sprinklers as well as smaller mobile units, and although water is not always plentiful, they have created a system of lakes and canals that feeds water to many of the farmers. Ingenuity! Also, one farmer became bored and decided to invent something - the jet boat. That technology is what is used in numerous applications, including the Jet Ski. Who knew?

Wild and Crazy

We had a lovely apartment in Christchurch that came equipped with a washing machine. It is similar to what a person would have in an RV and Don had thought about putting one in at the cabin. So we decided to try it. Don put the laundry in and he and Micky went to breakfast while I showered. As I stepped out of the shower, something was wrong. An airplane was taking off in the kitchen - I have never heard such banging and clanging. I raced into the kitchen to see what was happening, and clearly, the washer was out of balance and it had danced its way out of the closet, turned itself around, and was headed down the hall. Not having my glasses on (and you can imagine what else might have been missing), I began punching buttons to get the thing to stop. I called Don in somewhat of a panic, and he casually told me to rebalance it. How bad could it be? "It will be fine," he assured me. Ha! Not to be. After breakfast he came back and realized why I had called him . . . We got through the load of clothes, though it did it a few more times; and the next night, after we thought a workman had come to work on it (and we think someone did something), we tried it again.

The next morning, I showed the video to the woman at the desk. Her eyes were quite wide after she saw it. I hope they get it fixed before it explodes on someone. And before we get one for the cabin, we are going to make sure this is an anomaly and not the real thing!

Earthquakes

We Kansans have had very few brushes with earthquakes, and they all came in about a 6-week interval between Thanksgiving and mid-January of 2020-21. The pandemic has locked us down and we started having small earthquakes. They weren't very big, but they certainly were frequent. We got pretty jumpy after we were having one or two a day sometimes. So when we knew we were coming to Christchurch, we knew we would see the damage that was done with the earthquakes of 2011/12. Only two high-rise buildings still stand, and they were minimally impacted. But oh my, the Anglican cathedral? A mess. Many of the other buildings? Gone. What has been so impressive, however, is not the destruction but the reconstruction. Yes, there are many buildings still being torn down or reconstructed, but the rapidity with which the kiwis began to revive the town amazed me. Their buildings are now limited to five stories, because they have determined that is the tallest they can build and maintain a structurally sound building. They are using very innovative methods of allowing the walls to move with the earthquake, and their building materials have changed dramatically to lessen the weight of the buildings. The building pictured below is the new Arts Center/Cultural Center. It is a gorgeous building, and many of the other new ones are just as pretty.

The Quake museum has a number of displays showing not only the actual quake but also the methods they are employing to prevent such a cataclysmic event again. They will never stop the earthquakes, but if they can design buildings to better survive them, the better the outcome!

The Trees of Christchurch

We expected New Zealand to be green, but we did not expect some of the trees to be as massive as they are. One tree, called the Napoleanic Weeping Willow, was transplanted from a cutting taken from Napoleon's grave in Helena.

In the Botanical Gardens and along the Avon we saw several large Sequoias. They were not as tall as the ones in the States, but they probably have only been here since the 1700s or 1800s when someone brought them over.

The Tilia trees are large and perfectly round; others, such as the monkey puzzle, have crazy shapes; and I had no idea yews could be tens of feet tall and live for years - they are just bushes to me!

Punting on the Avon

When we first heard we were going punting, I thought it might be a rugby match or an Australian football game, but we learned that it involves a very sturdy flat-bottomed boat, a man or woman poling the boat down or upstream, and a very leisurely ride down a clear, shallow river. The "goldoliers" wear striped vests, a white shirt and tie, and a straw hat, and they stand on the rear of the boat to guide it. The clear water was beautiful, but it has very long eels in it, so it isn't very appealing once we learned about that! Through the 30-minute ride, we learned about history, trees, plants, and animals. Pictures include the boat house, the boats in the water, a view from the rear, the man poling the boat, and some pretty views.

Down Under

I cannot believe it has been almost a year since I posted . . . I guess time flies when you are having fun, and we have been having a lot of fun. And here we are on our biggest adventure yet - New Zealand, Tasmania, and Australia. We left from Kansas City at 8:30 a.m. for Houston, and after an 8-hour layover there, we boarded the plane for Christchurch, via Auckland. We are grateful the Gaskills suggested that we purchase a Skycouch so we could at least lay down - it really worked well, and after watching the Barbie movie, Don and I decided to try to sleep. Since we left in the dark at 8:00, and we arrived in Auckland at 4:55 a.m., we traveled in the dark the whole way. That made it easier to sleep, but we didn't sleep much . . . After a 3-hour layover in Auckland, we finally made it to Christchurch. A huge front had stormed in, and the winds rivalled any that we have in Kansas, but we hope tomorrow is better. It is about 70 degrees, and it would have been perfect without the wind. We went to the Antarctic Center, where we were able to see the smallest penguins, experience an Antarctic storm (though, frankly, it wasn't as cold as the day I drove to Diana's in January during the polar plunge), and we rode in a vehicle that operates in Antarctica. That was pretty interesting - we went up a 45 degree grade - and then down it - crossed a bridge with no center, similar to a cravasse, and went around a hill, almost on the side. We also heard a wonderful talk about Huskies, and I loved that the presenter said the first ones to the South pole were not the men on Amundsen's team but instead the lead dog!

Our driver, Breet, then gave us a short tour of downtown Christchurch and then dropped us at the Wyndham apartments. The first order of business was to purchase a hat for Don, since the sun is very strong here, and a large hole in the ozone layer near Antarctica makes it worse. Then we grabbed a very early dinner, and are headed to bed, as we have a very busy day tomorrow. We have had a terrific beginning to our trip, howevver.