Autumn is here

Autumn has well and truly arrived.  Cool mornings and evenings, the sun is rising later and setting earlier, but we are still enjoying nice crisp sunny days.  It’s time to ring the changes and hang my Autumn quilt up.  I love the rich golden colours in this quilt.  The centre baskets came in a kit sent to me from my pen friend  in South Dakota.  I wanted to make it bigger so put the baskets on point and added borders to make it a wall hanging size.  This was the first time I tried circular spiral machine quilting.

Baskets of Blessings, made in 2015

Autumn is a time of plenty, with feijoas and apples in abundance.  We have been gifted bags of feijoas, which I love, but Robin is not keen at all.  There are some left over, so I’ll probably use them in baking, perhaps some muffins and fruit loaf.  And Mary gave all the Sew Wot ladies a bag of super sized wonderful cooking apples from her own garden, thanks so much Mary.  These have been put to good use and enjoyed.

Feijoas and cooking apples

So what else have we been doing?  We had a busy day of medical appointments last week.  First, we had a 10.00am appointment at the hospital, and you can imagine the scarcity of parking at that time of day.  The car park was full to bursting with everyone attending a multitude of clinics, so round and round we drove.  Finally we spotted a spare car park, thank goodness for that. Inside the hospital it was a matter of masks on, sanitize hands,  and follow the orange line on the floor. 

 

We were here to see the orthopaedic surgeon who had done Robin’s knee replacement.  But first  Robin was whisked away for a couple of knee x-rays, then  we were ushered in to a consultation room and the surgeon breezed in.  The x-rays are fine, we were told, Robin’s previous knee replacement has healed well, and the surgeon could see the up-to-date state of the other knee.  Mmmm, that needs replacing too, we were told, probably get done in a few months time.  Documents will be sent out shortly with all the details.  So that was great news all round.  One knee done,  one to go.

Leaving the hospital we went to find the Covid drop-in clinic where we could get both the flu jab and the Covid booster at the same time.  Giving our details we sat and waited our turn, and before we knew it, a friendly and very informative nurse took us into her room.  There she went over details, answered questions, and delivered the flu jab, followed by the Covid vaccine.  All done quickly and efficiently, and we hardly felt a thing.  Such excellent service indeed.

Vaccinations done

With the medical business taken care of, we went for a quick lunch before traveling back home,  we’ve got a weekend caravan rally to attend.  The caravan was packed and ready, and we set off to Shannon School, not too far away from home.  When we arrived and were set up, Gemma found the caravan wardrobe door open.  Just the place to explore, she thought.  She loves little hidey holes like this to settle down and peep out of.

Can you see me hiding in here?

On Saturday afternoon of the rally Robin and I had planned a mystery tiki tour of the local area, to conclude with a BYO afternoon tea.  Cars were shared and off we went.  First stop was quite a marvel of engineering, the Moutoa Sluice Gates.  These were built in 1962 as a flood protection measure.  The Manawatu River here runs very sluggishly, and when in flood the river would overwhelm the stop banks and flood farmland.  The sluice gates cause much of the river flow to take a short cut, bypassing 30km of low capacity river channel, directing the flow down the 10km Moutoa Floodway.  The holding area in front of the gates was very wet and muddy and the gates had been in opened earlier in the  week.

Moutoa Sluice Gates

Continuing on our mystery trip we back tracked down the road to stop at the site of the WW11 Whitaunui Military Defaulters Camp, one of two in the area.  Sadly, nothing to see now, but in it’s time the two camps housed 250 conscientious objectors. The huts used to house the men were built by the Public Works Dept., mostly two men huts measuring 8ft by 10ft together with some single men huts.  The unheated huts were furnished with beds and straw mattresses, a pillow, and old army blankets.  The men were also provided with a small table and stool.  You could imaging how cold the winter conditions would be.  The men were required to work in wet conditions, cutting flax.  One of the more famous detainees was Rex Hillary, brother of Sir Edmund Hillary, hero of New Zealand.  On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers confirmed to have reached the summit of Mount Everest.

Housing for conscientious objectors

Back in the cars again we headed up to the hills for our final stop, the Mangahao National White Water Centre.  No races down the river this day, of course, but we could see the overhead rails all in place.   Over the years the park has been upgraded to international standards, and training takes place here by locals and international teams.  We have watched competitors battle the river at another venue, paddling hard as they maneuvered the coloured hanging poles - green (downstream) or red (upstream).  There were handy picnic tables on the river bank so we settled down to enjoy our afternoon tea.  Out came the thermoses, the coffee and biscuits, and we all soaked up the peaceful atmosphere.

The river looks calm today

I took a short walk up the road and over the bridge to the nearby power station.  The Mangahao Power Station was opened in 1924 and although very small by todays standards is still operational and continues to provide power to the National grid.

Mangahao Power Station

That was the conclusion of our mystery trip so we made our way back to the school.  Although some of our caravan friends who live locally were aware of one or two of the attractions where we stopped, not a single one were aware of the Military Defaulters Camp, and some had not been to the other two sites either.  It’s always interesting, I think, of how much history there is to be discovered as we travel around. 

Last sunset of the weekend