The Terrace

With the help of Nicola's dad and uncle Bruce, we've made a start on our "let's terrace the garden" project. So far, we've cleared most of the garden of weeds (although further applications of spray are needed) and uprooted a number of troublesome plants. Last weekend we levelled the area outside the cellar (some say "dungeon") door, and laid some weed matting, sand and paving stones. The result looks pretty good:

We're waiting for a good deluge of rain, so that the ground can settle and we can see whether we need to re-lay some of the paving, as I suspect there may be a bit of a dip...

After that, we are looking at the rest of the garden and thinking about putting in some retaining walls to terrace that as well.

Steps

Whilst Julian and Bruce have been staying with us, they've undertaken a  project in our garden. When we moved in, the garden was clearly in need of some serious remedial work, having been neglected, so far as we could make out, since the house was built. It had originally contained some nice plants (as we discovered) but had been left to run wild.

One of the first things to be done was to dismantle a structure beside the house, which we believe was a fort for the previous owner's kids to play in. It was stoutly built of fence posts and decking planks, so it took a bit of effort with a long spike and sledge hammer to take it apart. We tried to do it as gently as possible in order to keep the timber.

I conquer the castle

We sprayed all the weed areas, and then began the process of grubbing out the larger unwanted plants. These include aloes and a large flax, which was eventually removed.

Along the way we found a second citrus tree (we'd found one already, almost throttled by the undergrowth), an olive tree and a hebe. These we're trying to retain, so will keep the weeds away from them and hopefully they'll have a chance to grow and, one day, fruit.

Julian and Bruce then built a set of steps to go down the steep part of the garden:

All their own work!

The next stage is to level the piece at the top of the steps and pave it, as this leads to our dungeon. After that, there's more levelling to be done lower down, and we need some more steps up by the top of the garden.

Kapiti Island

Kapiti Island lies 5km off the west coast of North Island, just north of Wellington, and has been a nature reserve of one kind or another for over 100 years. These days it is a predator-free island and reserve, and hosts a number of birds not found on the mainland (except at Zealandia, or in aviaries such as Mount Bruce).

Our original plan had been to take an overnight trip there, but the lodge was fully booked on the weekend we wanted to go so we decided on a day trip. The ferry leaves at 9 in the morning, so we decided we would be better off if we stayed in the vicinity the night before, rather than make an early-morning trek from Wellington. Accordingly, we booked into a bed and breakfast in Paekakariki. This allowed us to visit the Southwards Car Museum in the afternoon, and also to explore a bit of Paraparaumu before heading to our lodgings.

A copper car. Yes.

After dinner we walked along the beach as the sun set in an almost cloudless sky.

That's South Island in the background

I received a text in the morning confirming that they would be sailing that day – which, as the Rauoterangi channel was as flat as a mill-pond, was entirely expected. I guess there are occasions when the conditions in the morning look entirely acceptable for a trip but the forecast is for high seas later in the day when they would cancel…but this wasn’t one of them. We parked by the beach and registered our presence at the Kapiti Boat Club, where we searched our bags for rats and mice, watched a short video about the island and its history, then went outside to board our boat.

Paraparaumu beach has a very shallow slope, so the method of boarding the water taxi is up a gangway whilst it is on a slipway attached to the back of a tractor. The tractor then pushes the boat out to sea until it floats off and is able to make the crossing. The journey is about 10 minutes. At the island, we walked up to a shelter and had a quick talk about the species we were likely to see on the island, and also the ones we wouldn’t see (kiwis, because they would be asleep underground during the day).

Our guide took us part of the way around, pointing out a couple of kiwi burrows on the way, then we parted ways as he took a group on the lagoon walk, which concentrated on seabird life, whilst we took the loop walk up the hill to the lookout point. Along the way we sought out and found various birds, including weka, North Island robins, swallows, and young bellbirds, as well as the inevitable tuis and fantails, often accompanied by whiteheads. We also saw a Pacific visitor, the long-tailed cuckoo, which was being driven away by an angry tui.

Hobbit holes...no, wait, kiwi burrows

Mini Babybel

As we returned to the lower level we saw several kakariki, although they weren’t being particularly cooperative in staying still. I managed to get one feeding on flax seeds, but my positioning wasn’t too good in relation to the sun.

As we returned to the lodge for lunch, we found that there were a lot more weka than we’d thought, and I needn’t have been so worried about getting a picture of one – they live around the human settlements and are quite bold in scavenging and stealing food. Also, several kaka turned up at lunchtime – they’ve been known to unzip backpacks to get at packed lunches. The injunction not to feed the birds seems not to apply to the birds themselves – they’ll happily help themselves to anything left unattended.

After lunch we had another walk around on the flat, where we spotted one of the island’s resident takahe (there are 10 on the island, out of a total world population of around 280), and also some saddlebacks, which resolutely failed to come out into a good photography position.

The water taxi took us back at around 3:20, and we had an ice cream in Paraparaumu before heading back home.

Black Caps vs. India

The Black Caps, as New Zealand's cricket team are known, aren't renowned as one of the world's great cricket teams. This summer, however, they've had a bit of a resurgence - first, sending the West Indies home without a series win (beaten in test matches, tied in ODIs and beaten in Twenty20) and now inflicting a series defeat on India in the ODI series. The series had already been won by the time the tour came to Wellington, having won 3 and tied one, but there was still the prospect of being undefeated against what was, until recently, the top team in the world (New Zealand's earlier wins in the series had caused their halo to lose its shine, and they'd dropped behind Australia in the ICC rankings).

We'd booked the afternoon off work, and went to the Featherston bar & Grill for a spot of lunch with my work crowd. A lot of them were going to the game as they'd scored free tickets handed out by ANZ, who are the major sponsor of the Black Caps, and cricket in New Zealand in general. (We'd had to pay for our tickets as I had foolishly used up my allocation on the West Indies test match. Why "foolishly"? Well, the test match had started on a Wednesday - a canny ploy by the organisers to ensure that days 4 and 5 would fall on the Saturday and Sunday, thus maximising ticket sales. I'd got tickets for the Saturday. Unfortunately, they'd failed to inform the cricketers of their cunning plan, and the Black Caps routed the West Indies in 3 days.)

We reached the Stadium in time for the opening ball, and watched as the Black Caps, put in to bat by India (who have won the toss on all 5 matches - someone should take a look at that coin), started off slowly and carefully. Whilst early wickets went down, with Jesse Ryder again failing to advance to a big score, the partnership of Williamson and Taylor put on 152 - Taylor getting his second century of the series and Williamson his fifth 50. As the innings closed, more wickets fell as the remaining batsmen took more chances to advance the score, and they finished on 303/5 with strong scoring from McCullum, Ronchi and Neesham who all hit at a rate of more than 100%.

304 is not the highest score that India have had to chase in this series (they managed to tie at 314 in Auckland) but they made a slow start, and from the beginning the required run rate was getting away from them. Tight fielding from New Zealand also restricted their boundary shots. Although Kholi put on a score of 82 and held the innings together, they put on runs too slowly and by the time the captain came in at 78/4 the required rate was already 8.7 an over, and it continued to rise. By the time Dhoni was out, the tail had an impossible task before them; wickets fell steadily and they were eventually bowled out with three balls to spare and 87 runs short of the total.

Whale Watching

On Sunday we were up early again, as we had to check out of the motel, get ourselves breakfasted and over to the Whale Watch centre an hour earlier than yesterday. This was achieved with the minimum of fuss and in fact we had plenty of time to spare. We confirmed that the trip was running and were then given a short safety briefing before being bussed around to the marina to board our vessel. On the ride out our guide gave us some information about what we were likely to see, and whilst he was talking we saw a small pod of dusky dolphins leaping out of the water. Later we found a larger pod, and the captain stopped the boat so that we could get some pictures:

After about 10 minutes, we moved on, as the captain had information about where a whale was, and when it was likely to surface. The main attraction is sperm whales, some of which live off the coast of New Zealand. They’re not migratory, and you’re pretty well guaranteed a sighting of one as the captain and crew can locate them by sound, and know roughly how long they stay down for before resurfacing. The whales we were looking for were all males, as the smaller females stay in more tropical seas nearer the equator.

Sure enough, a whale duly surfaced. The crew were able to identify it by various markings on its dorsal fin and flukes as Tutu, who’s been living in these waters for around 15 years.

Unfortunately, the movement of the boat was by this time causing me major problems, so I wasn’t able to capture any pictures of the final dive when the whale shows its flukes; nor, indeed, any of the even larger pod of dusky dolphins we saw on the way back, many of which were leaping clear of the water and doing all kinds of acrobatics. Nicola took these:

When we arrived back on dry land, I handed over driving duties to Nicola. I had intended for us to lunch at Nin’s Bin, a  famous crayfish stop, but was still feeling queasy so Nicola and Julian dined on the remains of yesterday’s lunch whilst I had a bit of water. We then  drove on north via Lake Grasmere near Seddon, which was very windy indeed. We didn’t stay long! We completed the final leg into Blenheim, and searched for somewhere to get a cup of tea. Eventually (most of the cafes were closed on a Sunday afternoon) we ended up in the Corner Stone pub, where we spent a restful afternoon drinking tea and cake and watching tennis and cricket – the Black Caps taking on India in their first ODI of the series.

Eventually we drove off to Blenheim airport to take our Sounds Air flight back to Wellington. The wind in Wellington had picked up again and we had a slightly bumpy approach into the landing, which didn’t do my recovering stomach much good. Fortunately we only had to take a taxi home and we were back in good time.

Kaikoura

We bunked off work early to get home and to the airport for a 6:30pm flight on Sounds Air over to Blenheim, then collected our hire car and drove the 128km down to Kaikoura. The first part of this drive is fairly average, but when we reached the coast there were spectacular views out over the sea. We’ve just had a bit of a blow here, so there were some big breakers rolling in…with a scattering of surfers in amongst them on some of the beaches.

We found the motel with no problems and met up with Julian, who’d taken the scenic (i.e. slower) route via the Interislander ferry and bus to get here. He’d set off at 9:00am and arrived mid-afternoon, so was able to check in to the hotel for us and explore the environs. This doesn’t take long as Kaikoura isn’t a big place.

When we arrived we were pretty famished, so unpacked quickly and headed into the CBD. The first pub that we came to had closed its kitchen (it was, after all, past 9 o’clock!), but we walked a little further down and found a pizza place called Passione – a bit better than Pizza Hut, I hasten to add – and they were happy to serve us with pizza, pasta, beer and wine. We then headed back to watch England play Australia in an ODI – at one point it looked like England might actually win a cricket match in Australia, but the Aussies had a different idea about that and they managed to complete the run chase with three balls and one wicket to spare.

 Next day we were up with the lark to go into town and get ourselves a good breakfast, as we were booked on the 10:30 whale watch departure. We trundled along to the Kaikoura Whale Watch centre, based at the Whaleway Station on Whaleway Road (yes, really!) only to be informed that the sea was too rough, with 5m swells, and that the tours this morning were cancelled. We were offered a refund or rebooking, so decided to rebook for the next day, Sunday, at 9:30.

This left us at a bit of a loose end for the rest of the day, so we decided to drive up the coast and walk around the peninsula. There is a car park at the beginning of the north end of the walkway, so we parked there. There is a seal colony here, and we spotted several lounging about on the rocks. We then went up a steep path to reach the top of the cliffs, and look around:

We walked along the cliff tops, seeing various wildlife including the ubiquitous red-billed seagulls, and some wax-eyes and a yellowhammer:

From the cliff tops we could see people walking down along the shoreline, and decided that we would see if we could do that from the southern end of the walkway after lunch.

We again parked at the southern end of the walkway and took the track along the coast. Fairly soon it started going uphill to the top of the cliffs, so we abandoned the beaten track and took to the shoreline to explore. The rock formations here are weathered limestone and form some spectacular arrangements as they have been bent out of shape and eroded. The birdlife seems unfazed by the surrounding geography.

In the evening we went out for dinner at The Green Dolphin restaurant, where we had fish and lamb. I was going to order the crayfish, the local speciality – Kaikoura means food/eat (kai) crayfish (koura) – but decided I’d get that tomorrow, as we would be heading past some famous eateries on the way back to Bleinheim.

Technical Support

Nicola's sister, Sacha is running in the London Marathon this year. She has started a blog to record her training and related matters, and asked me how to provide a link to her justgiving site for donations. I tested it out on my web site and have left it there, should anyone care to add to her donations. She's running for the Pancreatic Cancer UK charity.