New Zealand Links

Monday, June 18, 2007

Yes we have three cats. The stripey one, Roxi is around 17 years old. her son is the black and white one, Jonty (named after Jonty Rhodes the cricketer), and the all black one is Melvin. Roxi and Jonty have lived a very sedate life here with us all their lives.

We have just 'inherited' Melvin. He is an interesting cat with a very inquiring mind. On his arrival here his first escapade was to climb the inside of our chimney which needless to say created quite a mess when he leapt down again. He has a fascination with cupboards and small places and I have to be very careful not to accidently shut him in.

Melvin has had a varied and interesting life. Our second son acquired him from the SPCA as a kitten and he became the resident cat in a student flat in Parnell, Auckland. He would follow my son down to the the local pubs and cafes and was more like a dog than a cat. He lived in several flats around Auckland before shifting with Warren to Wellington where he terrorized the bird population in a valley behind the house.

Next stop for Melvin was a shift back to Auckland briefly before he was flown to Melbourne, Australia where he again lived in several places and he acquainted himself with the Australian wildlife. After four years in Melbourne he flew back to Auckland for a year and is now with us in the Bay of Plenty while our son travels without him. I would dearly love to put him on a plane to England so he can be reunited with his owner and they could travel again together. However the small flat in London is not suitable for a free spirit like Melvin.

Tamarillos

I mentioned Tamarillos in my last post and had a few questions about them. Here are some closer photos. It is very hard to describe a taste - they are quite tart, unless very ripe I find that they need some sugar as well. They have a strong flavour, perhaps a little like a melon but with more intense flavour.

I like to eat them this way -

pour boiling water over the fruit, peel off the skins, slice and put into a bowl, sprinkle with brown sugar and leave in the fridge overnight. Lovely with icecream. Yum!!

Tamarillo Chutney

24 peeled and sliced tamarillos
6 apples
6 onions
4 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons mixed allspice
1 teaspon cayene pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 cups vinegar

Chop up tamarillos, onions and apples. Mix in other ingredients and boil for one hour.

More information:-

http://www.tamarillo.com/Tamarillo/servlet/Serve?file=Home.htm

PS I have just noticed the spots on the fruit in the first pic - shows they are organically grown!

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Winter fruits - Here are some pics of our fruit that we enjoy in the winter and spring.

Our oranges are just starting to 'colour up'.

We have been eating the Tamarillos. They were once,
years ago, called Tree Tomatoes but were renamed as
a marketing strategy. The same was done with
Kiwifruit which we always knew as 'Chinese Gooseberries'

The lemons are also beginning to show their
true colours.

Our poor little Satsuma manderin tree is so
loaded that I have had to prop up the branches.
These are nearly ripe, they need another month to sweeten up.

Monday, April 30, 2007

Our Kiwifruit Crop

Here is this years crop, poised, waiting to be picked. This should happen in the next week or so. We are holding our breath as the weather has turned rather cooler and we don't want a frost.

Some of you in North America or Japan could be eating our fruit in a week or two. Most of our crop last year went to Japan and was shipped immediately.

Friday, April 13, 2007

Cars I have owned and/or driven

Here are some old pics of cars I have driven. The top left was my brothers car, a Morris 8 produced around the late 1930's. He owned it in 1970 so it was already a relic then. It was great little car to drive, and one thing I found when I looked after it for him for six months in 1972, everyone looks at you as you drive by!

The white and green one is a Standard 10, about 1958 I think. I owned it from 1965-67. It was reliable but lacked power. My first car was a 1952 Ford Prefect (I dont have a scanned photo of that as yet) bought in 1963.

The car above was my parents car, I think it was a Dodge. I remember that I didn't like driving it - too heavy. No power steering in those days. Prior to owning the Dodge they had a Model A Ford, a Singer, then lastly a Vauxhall, and a Simca. Later my Mother owned a Daimler which was a dream to drive.

Why am I posting about cars? I have no idea! Probably because I found the pics and they brought back memories.

These days we own a Subaru Imprezza, and a Toyota Lexus.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

A Visitor at Night

This little fellow is coming to visit us at our kitchen door each night. He is after the remains of the cat food and pushes the dishes around on the cobblestones as he licks up the food. He is getting quite tame and doesnt run away at all when I switch the light on. Our recent Canadian visitors were fascinated with him (or her). Do you have Hedgehogs in North America?

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Lahar at Ruapehu

We had an interesting event in the North Island last Sunday. A lahar come down Mt Ruapehu, an active volcano which is south of here. (We live in the Bay of Plenty).

This had been expected since 1995 when a dam was formed on the edge of the crater lake after an eruption. Slowly the water levels have built up til last Sunday when the dam burst. There were monitors in place to measure the stability of the dam and the crater lake levels and it had been ready to burst at any time.The Police, Fire Brigade and emergency services were prepared for the event and all traffic was stopped in the area. There were no casualties apart from some damage to roads and bridges.

In 1953 a lahar caused a railway bridge to collapse and a train went into the river causing well over 100 people to lose their lives. It was on Christmas Eve and many people were travelling home. My cousin was one of them, she was never found.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/event/story.cfm?c_id=1501171&objectid=10429432

Saturday, March 17, 2007

Home garden

Our Home garden is about a third of an acre and on it, as well as the usual garden plants (annuals, shrubs, succulents, hydrangeas, bird of paradise, bromeliads, roses, etc) we have - apple trees, Lousia plum, Christmas plum, orange, mandarin, lemon, raspberries, tamarillo, apricot, two fig trees, cocktail kiwifruit.

We also have a number of exotic and native trees - magnolia, birch, maple, six camellias, flowering cherry, bottlebrush, hibiscus, Australian frangipani, island frangipani, poinsettia. Natives trees we have are - a 35 yr old kauri, pohutukawa, kowhai, totara, rata, cabbage tree, various five fingers, miro, comprosmas, puka, lancewwod, tarata(lemonwood), pittosporums, - I have probably left out lots! Sounds like its a jungle.

Today I have been busy cooking and freezing apples from our two trees - one is Golden delicous variety and the other is Gala.

Saturday, March 10, 2007

One of My Gardens

One of my interests is gardening - I am lucky enough to have two gardens to care for, one is our home garden with flowers, trees, fruit trees, shrubs and of course a vegetable garden, and the other is a coastal garden at our beach house.

These are some photos taken at our beach house last spring (October for us in the Southern Hemisphere!)

Our beach house, in New Zealand called a bach, is one of my favourite places. Its a gathering place for family holidays and also a place of retreat where we can go to to get away from the stresses of work etc.

We are only a few hundred metres from a beautiful ocean beach, we have bush walks in the hills behind us if the beach is too hot. All around us are holiday houses that are empty much of the year so its a very peaceful location, apart from a few busy weeks over the Christmas New Year holiday time.

Monday, December 04, 2006

Kiwifruit

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\We have been busy for the last few weeks harvesting the Macadamia nuts from the trees on our orchard. They are 26 years old now and coming into full production.

The rest of the orchard is planted in Kiwifruit. They are harvested in Autumn, late April or May. The fruit is removed from the vines and transported by truck to the packhouse for grading, packing and then is exported. Our fruit goes to Japan or Europe.

Thursday, November 09, 2006

\Now here is a blast from the past!! Here I am with Granny Hansen, the year is 1968, the location is Lincoln, Arkansas. In the Ozark mountains.
We were staying with long standing friends of my Mothers. In fact my Mother knew Granny Hansen's son when he was on leave in New Zealand during the war - the Second World War that is. As he was going off to the Islands and didn't know if he would survive, he asked my Mum to write to his Mother for him. And she did - for the next 25 years. He survived the war and came back to the USA.
Gwen and I visited his mother, as well as his brother and family.

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Friday, August 10, 2007