doing

all this travel is getting me thinking about my favourite places and people.

For me places and people are well linked.

For instance, there are lots of overseas places I'd like to visit but no-one I love is there so I trade off time with my loved people with adventure.

But lately I just keep finding places I just want to be in.

Tekapo on a kind of hot day

Excuse the nasty mini-golf course with it's fake rocks.

Don't you love the lumpins? they are just for Daya.

As Louly and I needed to go home via Waimate (where the wallabys live) we drove north from Roxburgh to Omarama and then east towards the sea along Lake Benmore.

I'd never been down highway 83 before so I was very pleased to breathe in the beauty of the hills and the blue of Lake Benmore.

Louly is quite handy for work road trips.

She is good at surprising me with amazing landscapes. She'll get even better when she starts as the Lower South Island Young Farmers field officer and needs to travel far and wide to visit clubs and members.

I'll miss her though.

You've

read here a few times how lucky I feel that I have such great women friends in my life.

One of my newer friends is Nessie.

Nessie has a mind like a steel trap, she's smart, she's tough, she's tells it like it is,

my favourite kind of person

And she's from Otago

that's quite relevant cause until last weekend I hadn't encounted Otagans enmasse

they are a breed apart,

a good breed once you've cracked the code and I think I did.

But back to Nessie

Ok coming from the Waikato I know the ins and outs of dairying

but sheep are a whole new ball game for me.

I know I have the babies but two lambs do not a flock make.

What goes with large flocks of sheep?

working dogs

this is Ashley

one of 13 dogs that Nessie and Ben have

Aw cute doggie

ok yes cute, but these dogs work and work hard

they understand blunt commands, hard pats

and food.

So it did occur to me that working dogs spend their days sorting sheep out and then they eat sheep so their discipline is amazing cause their food smells like their charges

but you know what happens to dogs that worry sheep a little too much eh?

I got to Nessie and Ben's on Friday afternoon

in time to 'help' with preparing the dogs kai for a the week

I say 'help' cause Ben handed me half a sheep carcass and I almost dropped it

they are heavy as and their skinny ankles are slippery.

I did better the next day

when I helped Nessie as she chopped the halved carcasses into halves

quarter carcasses are much lighter

and I need to start lifting weights again

How townie is that?

Things are heavy so instead of just lifting heavy things I go lift weights

and you know I won't.

I was going to add a photo of the freezer filled with sheeps
but that was a bit too much for townie tummies.

If you think that would be a bit off putting, you might want to stop looking about now

Where there are sheep carcasses there are heads
and entrails otherwise politely or officially know as offal


Ness is not actually venting on ewes heads who failed to get knocked up

and were eating perfectly good pasture she is hacking open their heads to when the offal boil up finally gets going the brains cook too.

This is where the dog food comes from on farms
I'm having a wee moment of conflict here cause this is fairly obvious to farm folk but to townies like me there are lots and lots of on-farm things that happen that I just never thought about
but if I did it's obvious where the farm dog's food comes from in the most economical way.
It's not like there are a few thousand sheep close as can be,
much closer than a shop.


So fantastic Nessie,

who is probably reading this going what the hell is Sara on about this is normal!!!

Looks after the sheepies, keeps her doggies under control

provides lovely soft merino wool for jerseys, leads her corner of Young Farmers well,

is diligent and reliable, sensible and doesn't muck around

but most of all is a good friend.

Thanks Ness for a great weekend and I'm looking forward to visiting when there is less going on so we can sit on that porch of yours and really catch up.

See you Tuesday in Roxburgh!

on my previous

post, I was in Dunedin contemplating life and a drive to Becks.

Becks was easily found on the Pig Route up from Palmerston (the original Palmerston).

In the scheme of things Becks was an easy drive from Dunedin

probably not so much between March and October but then I'm a sook when it comes to driving conditions - which I am perfectly fine to drive in but I gotta have something to be challenged in.

I arrived to join the Upper Manherikia 75th Jubilee committee buzzing like bees organising the Becks Hall and rugby field for the celebrations that began that night.

Central Otago is another world in so many ways

I consider myself lucky to know some of the locals

ok two but I know more now

I stayed with Nessie and Ben

on their family farm

in their 150 year old stone house

cool in summer and freezing winter

Nessie said (I swear she did so gleefully) that the coldest it had got in her experience was minus 24 for three weeks

And she lives in a stone house that would be an ideal place to store food because it stays cool/freezing.

South Islanders are like that though, priding themselves on their ability to withstand subzero temperatures. More power to them I say...

so they can run their heaters, is what I mean.

But the Manuherikia Valley layed on brilliant sunshine and extreme heat that was a little like being on the face of the sun but Ben and Nessie's front porch was a place of pure bliss. If I didn't have to actually be at the Jubilee celebrations I would have sat there for ever

or until the midges go going.

There's heaps to tell so I'll spread it out over a couple of posts and beware they may be a little delicate but more on that later.

Nessie took me out with her to move some sheepies.

They grow merinos for wool and have put some work into developing their own fabric which from the feel I had of the jersey and the long undies samples was good, warm wool that would be divine to wear.

This photo is deceiving.

This is much bigger in real life, like that's mountainous type height there.

Ness and I wandered over to collect the sheepies to move them elsewhere, ok I wasn't taking that much notice about things so on our way back I had no idea where we were.

The sun was shining, the landscape on the farm was magnificent and we were moving at a very slow pace so I was relaxing to the point of falling asleep - which I may have done just a little sitting in the shade outside the kitchen that morning.

Good thing Ness had me drive the ute otherwise I would have drifted away into relaxed land and not got to the agrisports in the afternoon at the Becks Hall.

That day the agrisports included stock judging terminal sires and merino rams (Ness won the girls comp), identifying bizarre objects mostly off the farm, the Tui pass the ball target game thing, tossing a sack full of hay over a very high bar like they would have back in the day when hay came in haystacks and to finish with, boat races.

Boat races are a time honoured country tradition favoured by Young Farmers by where there is a team of 3 or 4 who face off against another team to have a relay race of skulling beer. Highly entertaining and the current Upper Man Young Farmers were beaten by the Naylor family of aged out Young Farmers to the shouts of victory from all aged out Young Farmers crowing at the demise of young people's ability to drink.

We even had a kids boat race with lemonade - it's harder than it sounds so they found.

That night found us back at the Becks Hall for the evening function of a lovely catered dinner

actually all the food was good all weekend

nibbles for Friday night, BBQ and salads for lunch Saturday

Nessie had offered me 5 of her 10 minutes to speak

which was how I got to know how enjoyable the front porch was,

a perfect place for speech writing.

So we enjoyed Snow's MCing and the stories of back in the day

James the current chairman spoke well

Nessie talked about the region under her leadership and always speaks well

I blathered on about the future of Young Farmers

which is fantastically good looking by the way.

Bevan from Ida Valley had organised the Life Membership award and presented it to Janet Smith who so deserved it for all her support of the Upper Man club.

Bevan spoke heartfeltly and perfectly for such an honour.

Janet was moved, as we all were.

Seriously I love being at Clubs when they do lifetime memberships awarding, it's so emotional when you realise how much the recipients have put into their club and the love and esteem in which they are held by the members, past and present.

That's about as emotional as farmers get.

A great weekend, organised under Ben's guidance and my hosts were exactly what I needed.

Thanks Ben and Nessie!

It's been

a maudlin day.

What with the Pike River miners and the way life goes on when it should stop for a minute and let us reflect on what's important. If only time could stop and just hold still for a bit.

I'm in Dunedin tonight.

I spent my day interviewing for the forth day for the forth job we have on offer.

The people we have interviewed have been good, solid posiblities which makes it tough.

You kind of don't want options when interviewing

you want one stand out awesome person to be everything you need

and instead we have lots of good choices.

It's hard work interviewing people and keeping them straight in your head.

On recommendation from Louly as a former Otago student,
I wandered over to St Clair beach in South Dunedin and

had dinner at the Esplanade cafe over looking mad Dunedinites surfering at 8pm at night.

It looked cold and probably was even though the air temp was a decent 18.

Taking a walk along the esplanade,
a slow walk just watching kids in their wetsuits playing in the waves

and the the surfers catching the waves,

breathing the fresh sea air

and walking that strolly kind of walk you have to take when walking any where near the sea

relaxed me a heap and got to thinking about the simple things in life

and how some many things are good

even when you are tired and far from home

or sad and longing for your loved ones.

So I bought some new season strawberries

and took them back to my motel to savour

and watch dodgy, random movies on SkyTV

(some strange Renee Zellweger movie).

A good night far from home.

It never rained!

True, absolutely true. It did not rain at Waimumu/Gore/Invercargill

I was thrilled.

In fact it was hot, earth parching hot and the best thing there was no cold Southerly to ruin the hot, hot sun.

Dunc and I drove for seven hours to Waimumu - from wintery Canty to balmy Southland - visited with the Waitane Club chair Don and soon to be Mrs Don, Jess at the NZYF stand.

They are a young power team if I ever met one.

Next day, Thursday Dunc dropped me and President Richie

(there are a few Richies in NZYF - this one is a sharemilker from Bay of Plenty who also has kiwifruit and in his downtime is President of NZYF)

anyway we were dropped off at Waimumu Field Days

(in Southland, dropping off means an hour each way - thanks Dunc)

I got to watch my first ever fencing competition.

these are the winners. You'll notice not a sword in sight.

They are Waitane Club members and are not fencing contractors

I think they are dairy farmers.

This upside downness is why I could/would never build a fence,

that and I don't know how.

And kneeling - not my thing at all.

and fiddling around with wire

and having to use upper body strength

and I would get crazy about perfect spacing of the wires or the gate not hanging evenly and you have two hours to get the fence done according to the instructions given so it's not like you just rock up and wack a fence up.

That's what you do on your own farm when it only has to keep stock in.

This was a Otago/Southland Region competition organised by MoffDog

(that might actually be spelt MoffDawg, will have to check)

I would post a photo of him but quite frankly his shorts are too short and have holes in them.

At the end everyone (one girl, yay Rebecca! rest are lads) stands around and has a beer.