Day 165 - Onerahi

My last day at David and Lyndsy's farm today - I catch the bus back to Auckland tomorrow. I'm definately going to miss my big bedroom and balcony, and being cooked excellent food every evening (if this is what all wwoofing is like, I'm definately a fan).

Apart from becoming an expert grass-puller and wood-chipper, I've also learned some good cooking tips from Lyndsay (who is Chinese): e.g. you can stir fry lettuce (tastes good), pumpkin leaves and stems can be dumped in the wok too, and you can make authentic sweet and sour sauce using only soy sauce, rice vinegar and sugar. Also learned some interesting things about diet and health whilst reading my way through David's literature: What Doctors Don't Tell You is the most memorable read (thay have a website) - some of the information is really quite scary.

I've now started flicking through my wwoof booklet to find my next location... exciting!

Below are some pictures from my balcony:

Sunset


During the day (the piddly trees are the mandarin orchard that we later mulched, and the lake behind is great for swimming)

Day 162 - Onerahi

Today the orchard mulching was finally finished (hurrah, no more woodchipping) and in the afternoon we went to a local beach and I managed to swim in the sea (blinkin freezing) and burn a nice red stripe across my back where I missed applying suncream. Don't know what my jobs for tomorrow wil be, probably fruit picking (pick one, scoff one, pick one, scoff one).

Think I may have to chill out in Whangerai for a few days before working on another farm, not having lots of people around to socialise with is driving me stir-crazy (resorting to long ramblings on my blog to reconnect with outside world).

Day 161 - Onerahi

Boy, just finished my second day of work and I'm bushed. It's not like I even have to do that much - it's just so hot!

I've already got into a routine: I get up about 8am ish, and have breakfast and a cup of coffee. Then I sit about reading and relaxing before starting work about 9.30 - at which time I put on ear protectors, goggles and gloves and tramp down to the tractor where a huuuge pile of branches awaits. For 2 hours I feed the branches into the woodchipper until my tshirt is soaked in sweat, I have permenant goggle marks and my arms are numb from pushing stubborn logs in as they shake and vibrate about. And the pile doesn't get smaller as David keeps chainsawing new bits off the tree and dragging them up to me. We stop at about 11 for a tea/water break and chill out till I feel human again. Then we go back out again for more woodchipping, or to lay cardboard and newspaper round the baby orange trees before piling the mulch (woodchips) on top. The theory being that the nasty crawling grass underneath (horrible stuff, not like the grass we have in England) will die out and the baby trees will have a chance to grow. Hmm, lets hope it works; woodchipping is bloody hard work, 'specially in this heat!

Anyway, we break about 1 for lunch and sit around reading and recovering. Then I go upstairs and have a quick shower (woodships in hair, woodchips in clothes, woodchips bloody everywhere) before collapsing on my lovely bed and promptly falling asleep. Meanwhile David goes back out for a few more hours work (don't know how he does it - practice I guess). I wake up about 5 and go downstairs, pretending I don't feel knackered and haven't just slept for 2 hours, then laze around till dinner or go down to the lake for a swim. My host makes the dinner (I do offer to help ok?) then we watch t.v. or read more and I go back upstairs and collapse asleep again about 9 (pathetic).

So, all in all I'm having a good, if somewhat knackering and slightly cut-off, time. Food is great (nectarines never tasted as good as they do picked off a tree in the middle of a hot day) and I think this week will go quickly (and I'm not spending any money - yeah!). I think I will do another week somewhere up north before heading back to Auckland. Maybe somewhere near 90-mile beach.