South West Road Trip

Kristen writes:

There's quite a lot to catch you all up on.
Leaving Goat Hills Station was very difficult. We very quickly came to love the family we were staying with, the beautiful farm, the delicious meals, the musters and tractor driving.
Still, we did have to move on and after a night in Christchurch we picked up a rental car and headed west across Arthurs Pass. We took a couple of days to go down the west coast. Seeing Franz and Fox Glaciers was pretty incredible! Standing at the base of a mountain of ice quickly makes you realize how small you are. The landscape along the coast is so dramatic and such a change from where we've been on the north east corner of the south island.

We turned in our rental car and met up with Andy, a friend we met at Goat Hills Station, in Queenstown and had a personal tour guide for our trip through the south.
And what a tour guide he was! We went four wheeling through the most beautiful countryside through all the changing colors of the trees. Of course we sort of killed Andy's Land Cruiser in the process but we take no responsability for that. It caught on fire before we ever got in it!
We stayed at another Station called Mount Burke with friends of Andy who were kind enough to put us up, feed us and then lend us a car since Andy's had bitten the dust. It was great to stay warm and cozy inside as the rain poured steadily for several days.
Then we all went on to Milford Sound where we learned that they had had a meter of rain in the last four days! It made for wet sight seeing but the most incredible and dramatic scenery yet! Waterfalls coming down on absolutely every side, in every way and place they could. It was incredible!
From there we drove on through the lakes, enjoying the mountains, the lakes and the drive.
We ended up at Andy's parents in Timaru for the last night of our southern tour before a very early morning drive up to Christchurch. We made it just in time to catch our train to Blenheim!

So, now we're in Blenheim again with the ever incredible Speedy family.
From here our plans have us taking the ferry to Wellington, renting a car to get up the island to Aukland, taking time to bike around where and when we can. We're getting used to going with whatever comes our way as everything about this trip seems to change with who we meet and all people have offered us.

Jewel and her jugs...of sheep drench (wormer)

Jewel and Kristen working the chute

it's me. drenching like crazy. we did 1500 or so in 4-5 hours

mostly because of Andrew. he's a lot faster than us.

getting the sheep into the chutes. like the gaiters look? changed into leather chaps shortly after this. those sheep are full of prickles

We're on a sheep station, man, you wouldn't believe how many pictures of sheep we have. We've weeded through them for you. This is us after a successful sheep muster (roundup). We pushed those sheep up some incredibly steep hills.

Andy the Electrician and Andrew the Sheep Farmer. They hadn't walked the hill--they drove the truck. I think they are actually laughing at us right here.

Those are our sheep moving up the hill. That little dot at the bottom is me, I think.

Sorry this picture is sideways. Kristen driving a big old tractor.

T'hat's the firewood we've been moving. Really working on our arm muscles right now.

These all go in backwards. Sorry about that. This is Jewel and Andrew mustering. Working hard!

Sunrise in Goat Hills (name of the station)

This is the pig I skinned on Sunday

This is the pig shoot we went to--prizes for largest, etc. Redneck central. We drank beer and looked at dead stuff.

This is Andrew's rugby game on Saturday

This is Jewel, working in the vineyard. They send these grapes to a winery to make wine.

Kristen unhooking the nets

view along the Queen Charlotte Track. want to make sure you all appreciate we walked 56 kilometers through these hills

Weka bird. they followed us around and stole our trash

Jewel and I excited about hiking

This is us: on the Queen Charlotte Track,
shooting at the Speedy's,

















hanging out at night with Cosi, Pelle and Camilla,













at one of our campsites on the long biking leg of the trip

Blenheim Vineyards and the Queen Charlotte Track

Kristen writes:

David and Pam Speedy were our last WWOOF hosts, Erika mentioned their vineyard and gardens in her last post.
We spent a week with them, working in the gardens with the other wwoofers there (the first time we've stayed anywhere with other wwoofers at the same time). Pelle and Camilla from Sweden were both there when we arrived as was Cosima from Germany. The three of them, Erika and I and generally four Speedys (including their two sons Tim and Angus) made up a good party. The work went fast with friends and our off time was very enjoyable, entertaining and usually pretty exciting.
Easter Sunday a third son, Nick, and another wwoofer, Meg from Washington, showed up as did our cousin Jewel who we had been waiting anxiously for. The whole house was turned upside down for places to sleep and there was a big party to celebrate our numbers.
The reason the Speedys had been collecting wwoofers in numbers was the harvest was due, unfortunately it was also put off as the harvester had double booked! So there they were with all these workers and very little to do but hold off the harvest. So we worked removing rot from the grapes, tying up the vine nets, weeding gardens, spreading house poo, clearing bush, demolishing a room on their sons house, and shifting sheep.

Last Wednesday Erika, Jewel, Cosi (from Germany) and I all got a ride from David up to Picton where we took a boat out into the sounds and got dropped off at a place called Ships Cove. We planned to do the Queen Charlotte Track in three days, which apparently is duable. We took three days and did over fifty kilometers! There was absolutely beautiful weather almost the entire time we were hiking up and down the hills, we only got one blister between the four of us and managed to squeeze all four of us into Jewels three person tent. We were really very impressed with ourselves!
Unfortunately we didn't finish the entire track and took a boat back a couple of bays short of the end. It was still an awesome treck and we had a blast doing it!

David was kind enough to pick us up from Picton, just off the boat, and take us back to their place where we had left Cosi's van, our bikes and quite a bit of our stuff that wasn't needed for the track. We had a big pizza party with almost all the family, Meg, both Pelle and Camilla who had stayed to help with the actual harvest and to see us once again, and two new wwoofers! Once again quite a party and really great to be able to see all our friends again.

Saturday we helped in the vineyard in the morning until it was time for us to meet up with our next hosts. Angus drove us to town where we met Neville and Lynn. You might recall from Erika's last post that we stopped off to help shear sheep and got a ride into Kaikoura. In fact we asked if they would need any other help at their place as we had really wanted to work on a sheep station while in New Zealand and they were kind enough to say yes!
So, yesterday we went to their son, Andrews, rugby game in Blenheim- our first rugby game in person and it was rather fascinating. Then the three of us caught a ride back on the team bus while Neville and Lynn took our stuff back to the house. What a ride it was too, honestly we had a blast and certainly will never forget the whole experience!

Now we're on Neville and Lynn's sheep station!
More news to come as we have it!