Another hot, dry summer has come and mostly gone in the Hawke’s Bay region of New Zealand and we’ve moved into autumn. Over the summer months water was a critical issue around our place and we were faced with some close calls. We managed to make a couple of day trips around the countryside on the weekends as we continued with our house renovations during the week. But for the most part, it’s been business as usual.
Sunrise over the Pacific Ocean… not something I get up to see too often!
We started off the summer season a little behind the curve having not stored up as much water as we usually would have with part of our water collection system being down during the garage building phase of our renovations. To add to this, the farmer next door who has traditionally supplied water to this farm – as well as to many others along the road – decided he no longer wishes to provide this service. So we’ve been left to come up with an alternate way to water our cattle. In the beginning, we were giving the cows water from our house tanks, but that emptied half of our personal supply rather quickly! In the end we had to open all the gates to let them free-range for grass and have access to a small pond at the far end of the property. The new arrangement has forced us to make some changes in how we store rainwater, so we purchased a new tank for the farm water. It was delivered on a truck through a couple of tight squeezes down the driveway and over a few squashed plants! Many thanks have to go to the truck driver for getting into a tight place with very little damage… the wrong guy would have said ‘no way’ and left the tank on the side of the road!
A tight turn in the driveway.
Made it into the paddock with only a few smashed plants and a scraped tree!
Another tight fit through the gate and the tank is almost at its final resting place.
The new tank in place… with a big steer to look after it.
For our personal use of water, we have what Jim calls the “Water Defcon Scale”, taken from the U.S. Armed Forces’ Defense Readiness Condition criteria. It goes like this:
WATER DEFCON SCALE
DEFCON 5-No restrictions, water usage encouraged!
DEFCON 4-No restrictions except lawn watering with tank water is prohibited.
DEFCON 3-All tank water usage prohibited except showering/bathing, full dishwasher loads, essential clothes washing. Bath water to be used for toilet flushing.
DEFCON 2-All tank water usage prohibited except showering/bathing and hand-washing dishes. Bath water to be used for toilet flushing.
DEFCON 1-Out of water, no usage possible. CALL FOR WATER!
We had to drop down to DEFCON 2 a couple of times over the summer but thankfully never ran completely out. I can happily report that after a really good rain in the past couple of weeks we are comfortably back at DEFCON 4. It’s good to know that even if we do get down to the bottom of the tanks, our local Bay View Volunteer Fire Brigade is not only our fire fighting team, but also our closest water supplier!
As our house renovations go, the builders got back to work after an extended holiday break over Christmas and New Year’s and finished the garage. They then joined Jim on the master bathroom where he had been working removing old walls and fixtures. As of the most recent report, the builder says he only has a day or two left and he will be finished. Then it’s up to the plasterer and us to finish what’s left.
The garage is pretty well finished except for paint… and that’s left for us to do!
A few weeks ago, Jim and I went for a weekend drive and stopped at the Pukaha Wildlife Center for lunch. While we only went to the café in the visitor’s center, the organization is much more than a restaurant and t-shirt shop. It is run by New Zealand’s Department of Conservation and is responsible for an area of forest in the Wairarapa Region that is home to threatened NZ wildlife. It operates conservation and breeding programs and is the starting/ending points for walking and hiking tracks through some of the last of New Zealand’s untouched forests. While sitting at our outdoor table eating our lunch, we were approached by a native NZ parrot, the Kaka. He was very interested in our food and promptly came over to investigate my plate. The second I took my eyes off of my food to get my camera, down his beak went into the sour cream on my plate! He looked quite pleased with himself having stolen his big dollop of cream… but it wasn’t really what he wanted and he proceeded to smear it all over our table. Thus was our first experience with a Kaka.
The curious Kaka comes to our table to have a look at the food selection.
Jim and the Kaka talk over the lunch menu.
During this mini-road trip we also stopped for coffee, but it was no ordinary cup of coffee. It was java from the Tui Brewery of Mangatanoka! Of course, those outside of New Zealand may not recognize the relevance of this statement, so let me explain. As in most places, different regions in NZ have loyalties to different beers. When we lived in Hamilton there were strong allegiances to Waikato Draught and Lion Red. Since moving to Hawke’s Bay, we’ve discovered that people like and support Tui. Maybe it’s love and support Tui. Like the signs say – “Tui…It’s the beer around here.” Tui’s ad campaigns in recent years have featured their brewery, so it’s pretty famous – at least in New Zealand! We had previously been told that the brewery, the heart of the Tui operation, wasn’t too far down the road. And it was true… right down State Hwy 2 was the Tui HQ… the Brewery – we had to stop, at least for coffee – it was a tad too early for beer!
Which one of these Tui Girls is the imposter?
The “New Zealand-Famous” Tui Brewery.
Another outing for us was the weekend of the Napier Art Deco Festival. Not being ones to usually attend such events, we happened to be in town when it was going on, so decided to have a look downtown to see what it was all about. Since Napier is one of the best preserved cities of Art Deco architecture in the world, it celebrates every year with a weekend dedicated to the era. People dress up in clothes from the 1920’s and 30’s and drive around town in old cars from the period… it’s really quite a sight. We were surprised to see so many people all dressed up in Gatsby-esque attire and flapper wear and, apparently, it’s that way every year. A lot of people from all around New Zealand come to Napier to celebrate the unique collection of heritage buildings and participate in events central to the Art Deco theme.
Activity from the Art Deco Festival along Napier’s Marine Parade.
An old car parked in front of the Masonic Building. Festival goers having lunch in the background.
The home of the Daily Telegraph is an example of one of Napier’s Art Deco buildings.
Our business as usual must include a word about our pigeons. Summer is the time when racing pigeon training beings before the racing season gets into full swing in autumn. Our training season went pretty much as usual except for one day: When we left our house, the weather was fine, the winds were calm. Hawke Bay was flat as glass. When we released the birds, it was the same. Sometime later, as we were heading home, the winds picked up dramatically. As we passed the bay on the way home there were white caps everywhere. When we got home, not one of birds had made it home and by that night, only five had managed to make it back. In the days and weeks to follow a few more came back home but many of them have never seemed to perform properly again. We don’t really know what happened that day, if it was the weather, or if was aftershocks from some earthquakes they had had in the area at the time, or what. Whatever the reason, it put a damper on our racing season before it even started. Hopefully things will improve before the last race in May!
One of our fliers.
While most days around our place pass fairly uneventfully, the last day of the quarter was “different” for lack of a better description. We had to arrange a meeting to hand over some goods a guy had purchased from us via an internet auction and that ended up taking the best part of the day; we had to get an escaped steer back onto our property and, despite our failed efforts, he managed to get himself back on his own – we don’t actually know how but gather it has to do with jumping fences; and to top it all off, the Hawke’s Bay region was rattled by a 5.4 magnitude earthquake! We didn’t have any damage here, but certainly felt a good bit of movement. I guess it’s probably good to have things shaken up every now and then – no pun intended.
