Wanted: Experienced Cow Wrangler

We arrived home the other day after spending the night "in town" to find two almost grown calves in our front yard. Well, Kip saw the big cow pies first, then found the cows "sitting" on our lawn. We think they must've been there overnight given the amount of leavings. Kip and Richard chased them into the sheep paddock until we figured out who they belonged to. They had somehow escaped from the paddock down the street and ended up in our yard. The owner lives out of town and was unable to help us move them. Getting them home involved herding them out of our sheep field, through our yard, down the driveway, down the road and into their own field. The whole family got into the act and in the end, I was running down the road in my gumboots trying to head the calves off before they got too far away. Too bad I was the one with the camera because I'm pretty sure I was a sight. After we got them home, Richard began scooping poop. All is well that ends well, and as far as we know the calves are still happily fenced where they belong.

Jack

Baby Jack, Cousin Jack, Nephew Jack.  He's 6 months old today and OH SO cute!  

Boys Getaway

Richard and I are not the only ones who had a break this weekend. Kip, Reid and Quinn got a break from us, and spent the weekend having fun with Nana and Poppa. They went on a bush walk, played miniature golf, explored the local country park which has a miniature train, a petting zoo and a fun playground. Poppa and Kip did repairs to the chicken coop and Nana scooped old chook poop and dug it into our soon to be fabulous vegetable garden. They had a grand time without us. Quinn loves his new wetsuit and can't wait to go surfing (aka boogie boarding). School gets out for two weeks this Friday and I plan to get all the kids into the surf and onto boards. Guess that means I have to dig out my wetsuit and shave my legs......

Weekend Getaway

Richard and I left the kids with Nana and Poppa and headed north along the West Coast of the North Island to a place we'd never been-Hokianga Harbour. http://www.hokiangatourism.org.nz/ We had no idea what to expect, and were very pleasantly surprised. Our accommodation was modest (http://www.omapere.co.nz/index.php?section=1 the website makes it look pretty darn posh... our room must've been the oldest one in the resort), but the setting was unbelievably spectacular. We stayed in a small town near the mouth of the harbour and our room was a stone's throw from the beach. I guess you'd be hard pressed to really call it a town, but it did have a gas station, a small convenience store and a bakery (that was never open). Driving to The Hokianga takes you through the Waipoua Forst which is native bush and home to the largest Kauri trees in the country (these are akin to the ancient Sequoias found in California). We felt as though we'd been dropped into a pre-historic movie set for the next Jurassic Park! Not long after emerging from the forest, we came to the spectacular view that Richard and the chickens are gracing. After checking in, we hoofed it a few kilometres to the headland at the mouth of the harbour. It felt and looked very like somewhere along the coast of Northern California. Luckily the tide was going out, so we were able to walk back along the beach. It was only slightly treacherous at one point where we had a choice of scrambling over fallen logs and rocks or racing the waves around the ocean side. Richard chose the former, I chose the latter. I got wet. After a shower and a nap, we drank a beer on the deck and watched the sun go down. Perfect. The next morning, our plans to take a historic harbour cruise were nixxed because of heavy fog (which NEVER happens....uh huh). On the way home, we drove to one of our favorite spots in the world-Opua in the Bay of Islands. We used to have an office there in our previous life and it's the spot we'll be picking up our charter yacht in a couple of weeks. Stay tuned for photos and stories of the first family sailing trip!

Richard (duh!)

The chicken (maybe not so obvious).
Copthorne Resort (great lawns!)
Our room is the one on the right.
View from the headland at the mouth of the harbour looking back into "town".

View from the headland looking south down the coast.
The walking path.
Walking back along the beach.
Crépuscule avec une bière
Silver ferns doing their spring thing and unfurling.

Biking Omaha Beach

Enough said.

Spelunking at Tarawhanui

On Saturday, we took a drive out a peninsula to Tarawhanui Regional Park. (That's pronounced Ta-ra-fa-new-ee.) It was beautiful, if overcast and a bit cold. We wandered down to a beach where there were 20 or so surfers and Quinn was in heaven. He has a thing about surfing and says that he wants to be a surfer. The boys took off their shoes and were in the water almost immediately. The tide was on its way out and we were able to explore some caves that spend a lot of time under water. Reid got soaked through and had to ride home without underpants and only a jacket turned upside down for pants. He didn't seem to mind.

Forsooth, I Swallowed My Tooth! How Uncouth?!

Quinn's tooth has been very wiggly for a couple of weeks.  Over the past few days he has allowed me to try to pull it out.  The other day, after I had another unsuccessful attempt, Quinn was walking around the house wiggling it himself.  The next thing we knew, he had a bloody hand and face and the tooth was gone!  Really gone.  We can only assume that he chose to eat it.  Nice.

Huntington Horseback Horror

Kip, my mom and I went for what was supposed to be a peaceful one hour trail ride in the mountains around Huntington Lake.  Little did we know what was in store.........

Kip mounted Cocoa, a sweet brown mare.  My mom was given Dandy and was told that she might start acting weird because she really likes to stay with her sister Sandy.  Mom had concerns about the tightness of the cinch as the saddle seemed to be slipping a bit from side to side.  She was assured that it was OK.  Dandy was fine for the first 15 minutes or so, but then she decided to try to scrape my mom off.  That was unsuccessful, so she tried trotting to jog her off.  No good.  So, she sucked in her belly, the saddle slid sideways and mom leapt/slid off barely missing a large rock on one side and a steep drop off on the other (this may be a slight exaggeration, but it is truly amazing she seemed not to be hurt).  Mom was amazing with her calm ability to both stay on the horse, and get off the horse when the going was as good as it was going to get.  After tightening cinches, and switching horses, we were off again for a mostly uneventful ride.

It wasn't until later that afternoon that my mom saw the enormous bruise, squishy lump and scrape on her wrist.  She's not quite sure what part of sliding/jumping off the horse, or landing in the dirt and bushes on her butt caused the wound.  Guess it could have been a lot worse.

No photos were taken of the fated rider or her horse.

Day 2 & 3 Huntington Lake

Kip, my mom and I drove up to Mono Hot Springs. The road is 16 miles of gorgeous and sometimes very hairy one lane driving to get there. We didn't really have a plan for when we got there, but we wanted to go. Kip did great on the drive except for a few complaints about how long it took. We saw beautiful Sierra meadows, incredible vistas, colorful wildflowers, and only a few other cars (thankfully). Once we got there, we explored the creek a bit, but didn't seek out the hot springs. We ended up having lunch-a really, really tasty lunch at the River Rock Cafe. They heavily advertised their buffalo specialties, so we took a chance. Kip was really excited to have a buffalo burger, which was huge. He ate the whole thing.


Yesterday, it was my sister-in-law's birthday so we rented a "party boat" and checked out parts of the lake we'd never explored before. We beached the boat on a little island and had a picnic lunch and swam. It was a beautiful temperature and we probably could have relaxed out there all day. However, the kids were eager to take turns driving the boat so we tooled around the lake for a couple of hours. We spotted a bald eagle and some osprey.

Huntington Lake Day 1

Kip and I flew to California in order to join my family at the annual get together at Huntington Lake in the Sierra Nevadas (it's near Yosemite National Park). http://www.huntingtonlake.com/
We've been coming up here for about 40 years. Hard to believe! What's even harder to believe is how little the place has changed in that time. We arrived yesterday late afternoon and after unpacking, went straight down to the lake for a wade and explore mission. Today we hiked along a beautiful stream and went back to the lake for a romp. Kip is having a great time, but he's really looking forward to the arrival of his cousins tomorrow.