The last month has been less thrill packed than the previous ones, but highly enjoyable nonetheless. On our trip through to Wellington we got stuck in the Wairapa reason, seen as it was sop nice. The small town of
Martinborough became our home and one of its vineyards our employer!
The initial plan had been to work in Wellington but we would have to have forked out far more for accommmodation and city living, plus, as it happened, on a fateful night in the Martinborough Hotel (which became or local) we landed a gig and there was talk amongst the locals of employment...a couple days later we were sorted for St. Patricks and a man named Rick had offered us all a job at the Te Karainga vineyard. Most of our time has been spent getting up at 5:30am for a 7:00 start at the vines....jobs have been thinning and removing secondary growth before ther harvest (getting rid of high up bunches and those which are unlikely to ripen in time so that the vine's energies are concentrated on those that will), netting to stop the birds getting in and checking/mending the irrigation system (a wet job seen as they were on). The weather has been awesome...infact, as I write this message in Johnsonville (Wellington), I am looking out on the first rain in over a month. The autumn temperatures have soared over 30 degrees which has made the outdoors work very pleasant indeed. We bid our farewells yesterday.
The music opened up a gateway to a new friendship with the manager of the Martinborough Hotel and his wife (Jonny and Sam)...who, following the very successful St. Partick's Gig, put us up in their old cottage just outside the town which was great fun and saved us a lot of money on the camping front. Great people, and hopefully we'll catch up in the future.
Other excursions whilst in the area included a trip to Lake Ferry and the seal colony at Cape Palliser and a trip into the bush with Jonny and Gerry (his kiwi friend!). More lines cast on the trip but few fish...Jonny, who has worked for the lairds in the highland as a poaching warden, is an experienced fly fisherman and also drew a blank...so we put it down to a lack of fish which were very easily spooked.
Last night managed to get through to the rugby, Hurricanes versus Crusaders in the Super 14...a great game and some classy rugby (a little better than Plymouth Albion even!). Check out the report on www.stuff.co.nz. Christchurch Crusaders are a little bit of a machine!
