The Hunt

We made a new friend this week. Or rather, Katrina made a contact, expressed a desire towards hunting, shocked the heck out our soon to be new friend that an American Doctor Woman can be something other then a vegetarian vegan snob...and an offer was made and a promise kept. Long story short, our new friend offered to take us hunting...and we held him to his offer. Needless to say it was an experience.

Zero Dark Thirty. Actually just a few minutes past 4:45 in the morning. We started at around 3:30. Hunting here isn't as easy as it used to be. Deer farming is far more profitable and common then hunting them. As such, the Government and a variety of other industrious personages have shot for meat export, trapped, transported and bred the once wild deer population in captivity. It has become an actual industry by itself. Granted, all mammals in New Zealand were introduced and most like the deer and wild sheep are considered pest animals by many.

Another pre-dawn photo. I took quite a few. Unfortunately I failed to notice that I had my shutter exposure speed too slow so the photos were out of phase. I didn't realize that until just after dawn. Have a close look at the vegetation in this. This is some species of thorn bush. Nasty stuff. It grows like sage brush but gets up to 6 to 10 feet tall.

Definitely a great dawn
Greg and Kat. Traditional hunting style. Walk, glass, sneak. This was open country, however the bush could hide a herd of elephants.
Taken at the exact moment of sun rise. The sun was just over my back.

Perfect timing. This country definitely produces great sunsets and sunrises. Granted...I make a point not to be up before the sun rises.

This was a cool little plant. It looks soft and cuddly and completely harmless, does it not? It is called the Spaniard. I call it hell incarnate. These buggers are nasty! Those soft looking grass like blades are actually very rigid. At the tip of each blade is a needle. Coming into contact with one of these bastards is similar to experiencing getting stung by a hornet with a prosthetic red hot steel stinger. They hurt. They also like to hide under and within other brush. Not fun.

Katrina, looking back to make sure I haven't bled to death. She was also warning me that just in front of her was another one of those demon plants from hell. I tend to walk without looking at my feet. I look down, plot a few steps, look up and watch for game as I walk. These plants had a different idea. They kept jumping in front of me. I suspect that our friend and guide, Greg was rather frustrated with my repeated yelps and gasps of agony.

Proof that the hunt was successful. Kat harvested a very large female or "Hind" red deer. No pictures of dead bloody animals. I am a tad bit more respectful then that. I couldn't resist taking a couple of more tasteful photos of the fruits of our labors. The easy work was done. The harder work of processing the animal was done. The last step was just beginning. I don't think any of us expected to get anything so we were un-prepared as to how to pack it out. Greg and Kat left their pack frames in the car. I was the only one with a real pack. We emptied my pack, filled up Kat's book bag with both our gear. The two front quarters and tender loins went into my pack that Katrina carried. Total weight...just about 60 or 70 lbs? I took a back quarter and Katrina's pack loaded with both of our gear. Greg took the other. It was all rather primitive. My elk hunting partners would scoff at me most likely.

I really couldn't tell who was more excited. Katrina for the success of the hunt...or Greg for the fact that we actually saw game, his gun shot straight and that I didn't bleed to death or scare away all the game with my repeated child like yelps from all of those damn Hellbushes. Oh right...Spaniards. If I were Spanish, I would petition the New Zealand government to change the name of that particular plant.

Now the truly hard work would begin. It was about a 3 mile hike down off the plateau back through the thorns, hellbushes and rocks. Oh...did I mention that it was 80 degrees? Tis a bit hot for hunting and packing out meat.

A very nice backdrop to our day. We were on a plateau with a gorge and ravine on two sides and extensive mountains on three. This was where Helm's deep and much of the Rohan scenes were filmed in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

Oh, and the meat tastes great. Red deer venison is superb. Thanks Greg. We owe you.

Nice shot out my kitchen window.

When it rains here, it really rains! This was after about a half hour of rain. In all, north of town it was raining about 6 inches an hour. Surprisingly the flooding wasn't too bad. But, it was bad enough. This is our street. It did not get past our side walk. Evidently this is a common site.

Driving towards Mt Somers.
Ok. I bought a fishing pole. You hear about how New Zealand has world class fishing? It much over rated. There are not a huge volume of fish. What puts NZ on the map is the sheer size of their fish. They are big! I would love to be able to decorate this page with pictures of the monster fish that I have caught. Except...I have not caught any. NZ definitely has world class fishing. You have to be a world class fisherman to catch one. They eat so much and have food available to them all the time that they don't feed aggressively like your typical trout. They eat exactly what they want to eat and only when they want to eat it. You can club them to death with every fly in your kit...but if that fish is not ready at that second to eat exactly that color and shape of bug that is on its own particular menu then you are S.O.L.

On a different batch of water I sat and watched a Brown Trout as long as the lower half of my leg for the better part of a half hour. I tried everything in my bag of tricks. I even poked at the damn thing with the tip of my fly rod just make sure it truly was alive and not a figment of my imagination. I almost expected it to bite off the end of my rod...but it just moved out of the way. Lazy fish. I need to re-learn how to fish evidently. I was so frustrated I walked back to my car and drove home.

I didn't see any truly big fish on this trip. I swear I saw a couple of 6" brook trout in this creek...but I suspect they were only young browns. About the only thing I caught were bites from sand flies. Nasty little buggers. They leave horrid large welts for days that itch like nothing else. Evidently you carry the welt and red spot for weeks. Welcome to Deet. I would rather deal with chemicals then that again.

I guess the secret of fishing is using a buddy to spot for fish and to guide your fly. Evidently they use binoculars, crawl on their belly down the rocks and through the mud and do all sorts of other ridiculous things to catch these fish. I don't know if they are pulling my leg or if they are serious. Alls I know is its cheaper to go to the market to buy the dang things than to catch them. If I had my rifle here, I would try shooting the dern things, that is how big they are.

South Island

Ok, so now I am on the south island of New Zealand. This is where I will be spending the majority of the remainder of my stay here. I haven't gone on any excursions of note and as such, I have a limited selection of photographs and stories. Every afternoon, I try to explore a different area close to home. Home is in the town of Ashburton. Ashburton is actually a once bustling farm town that is in the grips of overcoming a failure to adapt to tourism. Essentially it is a town that had a lot of growth in he last decade, but is now in decline.

The town itself is nestled almost in the dead center of the proverbial bread basket of New Zealand. It is a dead flat agricultural center filled with milk cows, sheep farms and crop lands. In reality, it is a perfect location in that the coast is within a half hour of easy driving and the mountains are within 45 minutes. I have meandered into the foot hills of the mountains, but haven't as of yet taken the time to get into the thick of things.

What you are looking at here is a California Quail. If you look very very closely, you just might see why I took this photo. How many birds do you see? If you said 13...then you have better eyes than I do. I went for a walk up the Ashburton River and jumped them out of their nest. Fast little buggers. The chicks can't be more then 2 days old.
Here you are looking at a shot taken while driving (on the wrong side of the road...from the wrong side of the car). It is just south of the town of Methven in the Mt. Hutt area. I was actually trying to get a shot of the clouds.
In the background is a glimpse of the Mount Somers range. These don't appear to be the friendliest mountains out there. Its a rocky, arid environment.

More of the same. Note the tracks and roads.

Me trying to figure out a way to get to the previously mentioned and shown tracks and roads. I still haven't figured out how to get back there. The majority of the access to the back country in this area is restricted to private access. My vehicle isn't quite suited to getting up there anyway so I guess its wishful thinking.

This is John. I ran into John last week (the week of the 12th of January) at Wakanui Beach. It was a tad blustery. John, be it a character of his name or his New Zealand politeness, turned out to be a very informative source of information. He introduced me to coastal beach fishing. It was a random encounter. This is the only photo I took. To make a long story short, I was walking along the beach enjoying the sea air and came across a lone fisherman. True to New Zealand form, he was very chatty, helpful, informative and patient of a green horn, flatfoot, foreigner. It was a very enjoyable meeting. He spent the better part of the afternoon running up and down the beach trying to keep his lines in the water, his feet dry, his bait secure from the gulls and his lunch out of the beaks of the shore birds. He was fishing for sharks and actually managed to catch quite a few. I will be attempting to hunt him down again to see if he can give me more pointers. I was so inspired, that I went out the next day and purchased a fly rod to do some fishing of my own. (Not suitable for sharks and coastal fishing).

I snapped this photo when he wasn't looking.

Wakanui Beach. Despite its tame appearance, evidently several people a year drown on this coast. Evidently the water is extremely dangerous due to severe currents and rip tides and unpredictable rouge waves.
New Zealanders love their wine. True to form, there is no shortage of eccentric labels and brands. The Kiwi's as a whole seem to be stubborn about separating themselves from the rest of the world by being as unique and individual as possible. For some reason, I doubt I will see this particular bottle in my brother's collection. Can you read the label?

That is it for now.

The last day on the North Island

This was actually a shot from the first day just out of Auckland. We took a couple of side trips, got rained on and this was about the extent of what I experienced on my very first and very short "tramp" in NZ. Nice though....

Our last true day on the North Island. We took a side trip off of the main highway to Waipu Cove and a three hour hike along Mangawhai Cliffs. The beaches below the cliffs were pristine, clear and a sea shell hunters delight. One area in particular had literally piles of shells by the tens of thousands, deposited by wind and water at high water marks. Pictures do not do

this region justice. It was actually a fairly easy jaunt along a very maintained trail system along the tops of the cliffs and ridges. There were a few hundred steps scattered along the track that I neglected to take photos of.

We started this "tramp" at the top of the picture across from that little island where the sand dune spills down onto the beach.

The half way point, around that bend at the top of the below photo. If you squint...you just might see the seagull below? Just kidding. His little spire is around the corner.

Katrina wanted to turn back after about an hour and a half. We were warned that we would not be able to walk the coast back due to high tides. I convinced her to trek down the last hundred stairs or so to the water. From there we decided to chance the tides. We figured we could scale the ridges back up to the trail if the water got too high. Yeah...a typical "tourist gets trapped and needs rescued during high tide" news flash.

Actually, there was absolutely no difficulty. The closest the water got to the cliffs was about 80 ft. It was still a difficult walk though. Wearing sandals and navigating the sharp rocks, gravel shelves and the nasty sea shells is not really a good idea. Yes....sea shells. There were so many in places that they actually looked like gravel. They area also very sharp and very painful on the feet.

Yes, those are all shells. The water was full of bi-valves that I also neglected to get photos of. All in all, there were a large variety of shells. Below you can see the few that I stuffed into my pockets as we walked. At the time we thought that we were in need of speed to beat the tide. As such...we didn't actually look for shells. These were the ones I found right at my feet as we clamoured the rocks and trotted down the beach.

This is the last bulk post that I will do for some time. My pictures after this point have been fewer and farther in between. So far, I haven't done much on the South Island. The vegetation and terrain are completely different. Its virtually like being on another world, when comparing the North Island and the South Island.

Maori Wood Carving

I took and posted far too many pictures of this particular meeting hall. It was built in the 1930s by the Maori in commemoration of the signing of the peace treaty between the British Government and the Maori people. The treaty was signed in 1840 and ended a particularly nasty conflict between the Maori and the British Government. Surprisingly, the Maori got the better end of the deal and even now there is considerable debate regarding the verbiage of the dual language treaty. Amazing carving. It took 6 years for craftsmen to carve this buildings structural posts and to carve the canoe shown below. The location is Waitangi, on the Bay of Islands. Its definitely worth reading about. Look it up sometime.

Note the detail. Each post is directly linked to its polar opposite on the other side of the room via the decorative roof beam. Each opposite pair of posts represents a particular tribe or sub tribe of the Maori.

It actually took three Kauri trees to carve this beast of a war canoe. I don't remember the dimensions, but suffice it to say its a large canoe. It was built for the 100 yr anniversary of the treaty between the Maori and the British Crown in 1940. It holds 160 warriors, weighs several tons and takes a week of soaking to swell up the joints enough to stop the leaks at the seams between the tree trunks that this hull is carved from.
To the left: Katrina posing in the entry way to the museum. If you make it to NZ and the north Island. Take the time to go to Waitangi and visit the Treaty Grounds and museums.