Birds and Beer!!!!!!!!!
New Zealand is home to this little furry thing called a Tui. It makes the most beautiful sound and it has these two little feathers just below the neck. To me, they look just like two..., hmmm, well, let me leave it up to your imagination; it's on the males only anyway, so go figure!! :-) We have some of them on the farm here, but I have not been able to get a nice picture of them taken.

http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?imgurl=http://whiteherontours.co.nz/images/tui.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.whiteherontours.co.nz/tui.html&h=478&w=383&sz=34&tbnid=lxkoQ6ldDaQJ::&tbnh=129&tbnw=103&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtui%2Bbird&hl=en&usg=__3E6VGXyZnRha0qYdBqG5EKma6TU=&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=3&ct=image&cd=1

This extremely long link should take you to a site where you can hear the Tui's call.



TUI, is also a local beer!!! Now that's better!!! Let's talk about the better stuff. So we decided to drive out to the TUI brewery up country to go look at how they make what we've been tasting!!!

Observe closely the opening and closing times - have I mentioned that the TUI guys are extremely witty?

In the Curios shop we tried on some very orange merchandise...

The sambrero was a bit over the top, really. So I ended up walking out with my beer mug and a scarf. Seeing that sunshine is not available off the shelf everyday, I thought the scarf to be more useful - and it has been!!!!

Maybe in some strange language TUI means orange? See, it even infected the blog's text editing tools!!!!

Best to fill up for the long road home, or wherever you are heading...

No no, relax, Niel was the designated driver!!!

Even the Pool Table was Tuisized

...and Tuisized bathrooms

Not even the garden gnomes escaped the wrath of the TUI invasion! But, they looked happy, so we left them to their business.

No, really, it's actually a real brewery, not some bar owner's obsession with orange and birds

They say it is very important to understand where the beer comes from, as nicely explained in the Tui museum. Now, sometimes Sonja has the camera and I actually appear in some shoots, but a heads up would be nice to muster a smile. But, by this time lesson-time was over and I really just wanted to get back inside to the bar. :-)

Yep. This bar!

OK. No coment on the next two pictures.

Did I mention the wit thing yet?

Just above the bar you get this lounge. The bed in the far corner, well, it seems some may get past the point of just relaxing and a more intense form of recreation is called for. Who knows, I didn't want to ask.
We only caught this on camera on the way out. But, yeah, we did feel welcome, thanks!!!

Views From The Back Yard
So, you guys have seen the house, now, what’s up on the 13-14 acres of land??? It’s hilly and grassy, but fortunately bad fencing allowed a neighbouring farm’s stray sheep to graze our paddocks!! The north fence is lined with Pine forest and the East (back) side has a larger part of forest on our property, complete with a mountain stream – obviously more prominent during rainy times. Spiders and moths are plentiful, the sheep count to 8 or 9, never sure where they all roam most of the times. Possums are a pest, apparently, but I’ve never seen any around. The bird song during daytime is amazing, and in stark contrast is the absolute silence at night. The absence of night insects like crickets is a strange thing to get used to. African nights are in no ways quiet. This silence is almost deafening, yet it has a serene beauty to it. Yeah yeah, you guessed right, WE LOVE IT HERE!!!!!

Without further a due, allow me to intorduce the strays... One little bugger was having himself a nice little snooze in the lazy afternoon sun, but woke up when I moved past to the other side (See next photo) This is the paddock right behind the house.

.. And this be the little one I woke from a deep sheep nap. He looked so mif at the time, not impressed at all!!! (To the back you can see the southern neighbour's house, down the hill and through a ditch)

Not so far away the rolling green hills give way to the serene inners of the pine forest with a stream running down to the neighbour's fence.

I just turned around and took this one uphill, where the stream comes from, it's exact origin still a mystery. Not sure how the other neighbour would feel if I just go fence hopping and prance around his back yard. They're so far away I haven't even seen them to this day!!!

It's quite a steep climb up the hills in the forst.

This is the view of our house from up top just out of the forest with the ocean line visible to the west.

I had a companion on this afternoon who demanded we stop and rest. He wanted to "take in the view", but I knew the steep climb was just too much!! :-)

On the front corner of the property where west and north fences meet. This is the view of Kapiti island.
And another one of those.
So for those of you geekish enough to know what Google Earth is, and you have this burning desire to get bthe bird's eye view of just where we abide, you can navigate to:
Lat: 41° 0'33.82"S
and
Long: 174°56'6.20"E

Hmmm., for the rest of you, get on the plane and come visit us!!!! You won't regret it!!!!

Beautiful Places

Queen Elizabeth Park – Paekakariki

Ok, so we live an odd 40km’s from Wellington City, out in the hills. The small town below us is Paekakariki. The beaches are long stretches of sand with some of the most awesome sunsets as it goes down over the silhouettes of the northern tip of the South Island. The following set of images are from the QE park when we celebrated Niel’s first B-day in New Zealand… There's a lookout point and hiking trails that can be taken along the beach or a bit more inland. It's amazingly clean and beautifull. The toilet facilities are also clean and comes complete with toilet paper and hand dryers!!!!! Where in SA I ask you???!!!! :-)

The nature in Queen Elizabeth Park

Picnic on the lawns of the park...

Sunny and beautiful day, but not warm, guess the avg. temp was about 16/17 degrees...

Niel opening presents

All done opening presents!! Now does he look like a happy chappie in NZ or what??!!

Cars parked close to amenities...

Inland views from the look out point

Ocean views from the lookout point...

Wellington!
The city closest to us. Amazing, beautiful and clean. Busses. trams, cars, bikes, motorbikes, skateboards, pedestrians; yep, any means of transport available and it works!!! The entrances to buildings are just that, entrances. It's not the homes of lost and destitute souls littered with cardboard boxes and old bedding. There is, however, a bum! One! And he's known to all here. Been here as long as most can remember - I've seen the chap, but didn't have a camera with me at the time to get a shot!!! WIl get one soon!

The city is littered with benches, parks and spots where people have coffee, smokes and lunch breaks. The traffic is moderate to NOTHING!! In front of Telecom I tried getting a shot of some traffic but the odd one or two that came by just missed the camera!! :-) Yep, peak times there's more traffic, but not even closely matched to what we're used to in Cape Town, not even to mention that nightmare in Gauteng!!!!!

The centre of the the Wellington Waterfront

Close to the Intercontinental Hotel - the brown glass building on the right...

Buildings around Post Office Square

The Telecom offices where Niel now works in the HR department's IT support

With your back to Lambton Harbour this is the view into the city centre...