A Visit to Annie's

Isn't this such a lovely looking shop?  Heading back north, we stopped at Ashburton once again for an overnight stop.  We whizzed right past Annie's when we were heading south down the island, so I was determined to call in for a visit on our return trip.  And I wasn't disappointed.  Annie’s Country Quilt Store is based in a 100 year old pioneer cottage, and is chocker-block full of delights. 

Annie’s Country Quilt Store

I had forgotten about owner Rachel’s love of egg beaters, and there they are, still hanging up on a rail.

Rachel’s egg beater obsession

Plenty of goodies in this shop

There was such a lot to look at.  I checked out some patterns, looked at lots of lovely fabric, and purchased a couple of gifts, it’s always handy to get them done ahead of time.  Then two lots of fabric for me, I have projects in mind for these.

These two for future projects

My knitting is coming along well.  I’ve passed the armhole shaping on the back of my cardigan/jacket and now I’m about half way up the back yoke.  I’m really pleased with my progress as you may remember I unraveled the back a while ago as I had not cast on enough stitches and was knitting merrily away before I discovered the error.

Nearly finished the back

So how is the South Island  holiday going, you may be wondering?  We stopped of at Waimate, a lovely little town.  Did you know that there are wallabies in Waimate?  Wallabies were introduced from Australia and released for hunting purposes near Waimate in 1874. Fifty years later, they were recognized as a pest, responsible for destroying pasture, native regeneration, damaging fences and displacing stock. They may look cute, but they are an introduced species and are not welcome.

Waimate has unwanted wallabies

Another claim to fame in Waimate is their white horse high up on the hill.  Retired farmer Norman Hayman and his wife Betty spent three months to prepare the ground and lay 1220 concrete slabs, with a huge 2.5 ton precast head. This was  tribute to the hard working Clydesdale horses who worked  the farms.  On a trip to England, Robin and I spent some time checking out several of the UK’s famous white horses on the hills,  each one was quite unique.

The White Horse of Waimate

We stopped to admire the Silo Art back in town.  Waimate artist Bill Scott painted murals on grain silos at Transport Waimate’s Queen Street yard.  The silos were built by hand in 1920 and were the first of their kind in the country.  Hometown hero  WW11 soldier Eric Batchelor was twice awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal for conspicuous bravery when he served in Italy.  Beside him is Margaret Cruikshank, the first registered woman doctor in New Zealand.  She practiced in Waimate from 1897 until she fell victim to the 1918 influenza pandemic while treating patients.

Silo Art

The reason I was so keen to stop at Waimate was to visit one of the pubs in my “Great Kiwi Pub Crawl” book, and check out the sad story of Ted’s Bottle at the Waihao Forks Hotel. Ted d’Auvergne was having a farewell drink or two with his mates at the pub, waiting for the train to take him to Burnham Military Camp for training before heading off to war.  Ted heard the train coming, and left an unopened bottle of beer on the bar, calling to the publican to “save it until I get back”.  Ted served for two years in the Middle East, was transferred to Greece, and was killed in May 1941 in the Battle of Crete.  The publican saved Ted’s bottle of Ballins XXXX beer, and it is now stored in a case above the bar, engraved with Ted’s battalion insignia.  Each April on Anzac Day, another poppy is placed inside the case, and the locals drink to Ted and all his fallen comrades.  There is a statue of Ted outside the pub, showing him waiting with his kit bag at the station.

Ted’s Bottle at Waihao Forks Hotel

So that's what we have been getting up to the last few days.  We are cutting our holiday short by two weeks,  as Robin has a problem with  his leg and is up to his second lot of antibiotics.  You can imagine the stress we had trying to find a doctor while on holiday and traveling around.  I felt it was better to be cautious and head home a little earlier than we had planned, but  the earliest ferry booking we could get is in ten days time.

Noah’s Ark Stitchery

Slowly but surely, my Noah’s  Ark stitcheries are coming along.  In between traveling and sightseeing I’ve enjoyed some stitching time outside in the warm weather.  Or I should say “hot”, as some of the afternoons have been very hot indeed.  Here is my latest little finish, two lions and two blue birds  waiting their turn to climb aboard the Ark.  I must say that they seem to be a pair of rather strange looking lions indeed.  But Noah chose them, so they must be OK.

Stitching outside in the afternoon

The lion block is the fourth one I have done.  Together with kangaroos, rabbits and the dove.

Noah’s Ark stitcheries so far

Our South Island holiday continues, and currently we are staying at Lake Manapouri which derives its name from a Maori word meaning “lake of the sorrowing heart,” with reference to a legend that its waters are the tears of dying sisters.  It is situated in the World Heritage Site Fiordland National Park, with fiords and lakes all carved out by ancient glaciers.

Lake Manapouri

We can certainly remember the uproar and the nationwide protests in the 1970s when a plan was proposed to raise the level of Lake Manapouri by 12m to provide more water storage for the Lake Manapouri Power Station.  Eventfully the idea was scrapped, and meanwhile John Hanlon’s song “Damn the Dam” became the rallying call to stop this happening. 

"Damn the dam cried the fantail,
  As he flew into as he flew into the sky,
  To give power to the people
  All this beauty has to die”…

Down at the lakeside is a monument showing just how high the water would have been raised if the plan had gone ahead.  You can see the lake in the distance.

Fellow campers had recommended The Church café/bistro in town, so we took ourselves there for Saturday lunch, and what a lovely place it was.   Originally Otautau St Andrews Anglican Church St Andrews, this lovely old building was re-sited at Manapouri and found a new purpose in life.  We were joined at our table by another caravanning couple, who, like us, didn't want to eat a meal perched up on bar stools.  At our age, a dining table and chairs suit us much better – oh dear, the joys of getting older.

Saturday Lunch at The Church

Now in New Plymouth

We are in New Plymouth for several days, just take a look at this glorious mountain which is looking down over us.   Early mornings are often the best time to catch a glimpse of Mt Egmont without too many clouds obscuring the view.  Also known as Mount Taranaki, it  is New Zealand's most perfectly formed volcano. The mountain is around 120,000 years old and last erupted in 1775 and volcanologists agree that the mountain is 'dormant' rather than extinct.

Mt Egmont

If our little Gemma was interested in such things, she could look out the caravan window to admire the view of the mountain herself.  But she is more interested with snoozing, eating, and chasing her little balls around inside.

Emma sleeping in the window

In fact, we got up close and personal to the snow on the mountain as we drove up to North Egmont Visitors Centre.  The higher we drove, snow started appearing on the edges of the road, getting thicker the closer we got to our destination.   The car park was full – being a Sunday it seemed everyone was out and about.  Children were having fun playing in the snow, throwing the occasional snowball, and slipping and sliding about.  We walked carefully up the snow covered walkway to the Look Out, which gave us a rather hazy view over New Plymouth.  As I’m getting older, I find I’m a lot more concerned about falling when I’m walking in strange places – a sign of the times, I suppose.

Snow is quite a novelty to us where we live, and it’s more years ago than we can remember when we were last slipping and sliding about in snow.  Lovely to see up close, and great to see so many people out and about enjoying themselves.  The Visitors Centre also housed a café, so we carefully negotiated the snow covered steps and deck.  A hot drink was in order, which we enjoyed looking out at the view through the large picture windows.

Holiday or not, the laundry must get done.  Luckily there was a laundromat quite close to where we are camping, (I needed to use two machines) and being a nice sunny day, I could hang it all out on the clothesline at the camp.

Keeping the laundry up to date

We went for a short walk around the beautiful Pukekura Park today.  The park covers 52ha (128 acres) right in the heart of the city and is one of New Zealand's premier botanical gardens.  Standing right be the lake was a monument erected to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee (1897) of Queen Victoria.   I’d never noticed this monument before, on earlier visits.

Monument to Queen Victoria

The lake is so beautiful and serene, surrounded by native trees and lush ferns, and with plenty of exotic flowering trees and shrubs too.  Swans were swimming lazily by, and people were walking around the lake, a delightful place indeed

The waterfall was constructed in 1968 with the help of a generous donation to the City of New Plymouth from NZI.  And close by on the path is a huge “Ficus Macrophylla” Morton Bay Fig which we stopped to admire.

Waterfall and imposing Morton Bay Fig

Our time at New Plymouth is almost over, and we are moving on tomorrow.  Just done a little stitching on my New Zealand Botanical block, and then got my knitting out but only managed a few rows here and there, while Gemma is tucked up sound asleep.  Once Gemma sees those knitting needles moving about invitingly she jumps up beside me and is all set to play with the needles, chew the wool, so it’s time to give up and pack it away again.

Not much knitting got done.

Stitching Kowhai Leaves and Road Trip Tales

I’ve been stitching away on the third of my New Zealand botanical bocks.  This one is called “Kowhai Circlet” with a whole lot of small kowhai leaves to be stitched.  So far  I’ve done half of them, together with the circlet, and the various stems.  Once all the leaves have been completed, I can start on the pretty bright yellow kowhai flowers.   But as I’ve said before, every little bit helps.

 

Weeks into our road trip, I’ve come to the conclusion that I get more stitching done if I leave my stitching bag out on the sofa, instead of putting it away in the cupboard each night.  Out of sight means out of mind, as it’s turned out.  Having my bag to hand, it is just so easy to pick it up on a sunny afternoon and start stitching, rather than to go looking for the bag when it has been put away.  Does that make sense to you?

As for holiday news – we are continuing to slowly move northwards.  The climb towing the van up the steep Takaka Hill (800m high) was slow and a little nerve-wracking, when we met a large truck coming around a tight corner straight towards us.  Some of those corners were real hair pins but the driver (if not the navigator) kept his cool, and kept on keeping on.  The views, as to be expected, were magnificent.  Mountain after mountain, one behind the other, as far as the eye could see.

Trip over the Takaka Hill

We went to visit a very special place, the Pupu Springs.  Te Waikoropupū Springs (their full name) are the largest freshwater springs in New Zealand, the largest cold water springs in the Southern Hemisphere and contain some of the clearest water ever measured.  The entrance way has carved posts, and information panels telling of the springs and their special meaning to the Maori people.  We walked along a track through native forest, along an easy path and boardwalk.  The bush ringed pool is absolutely beautiful, full of the clearest of water bubbling up to the surface.  A little further around the boardwalk was the Dancing Sands Spring, where the bubbling water moves the white sandy bottom of the pool around, making the sand really look like it is dancing.

Pupu Springs

There was a lot to explore in this area, places we hadn’t been before.  One day we decided to visit Totaranui, to see what was there.  Our trip started with driving through a hole hacked out of the rock,  and then we were on our way.  We reached the end of the sealed road and turned onto a 10km wiggly unsealed road to take us down to Totaranui on the coast.

On the way to Totaranui

There is a huge DOC campground at Totaranui, which is on the edge of the Abel Tasman National Park.   The place was teeming with walkers, all keen to walk the tracks throughout the park.   We watched as crowds of campers milled about down on the beach, getting off and on the water taxis, as they lugged heavy back packs.  We were surprised at just how many keen young people there were ready to tackle these tracks over the mountains.

Water taxis at Totaranui

The Abel Tasman National Park was named to honour Abel Tasman who visited New Zealand way back in 1642 but did not actually land here.  We stopped to view the imposing Abel Tasman Monument on the hillside, and were entertained by the antics of a cheeky weka, another flightless New Zealand native bird,  as we walked up the path.

Cheeky weka and the Abel Tasman Monument

Another interesting visit was to  Labyrinth Rocks.   The Labyrinth is a world class example of karst limestone topography, we read.  We walked along narrow passages, ducking under trees, with towering rocks all around us.  About 25 million years ago the land was lifted out of the sea, and the tremendous forces taking place caused a series of cracks through the rocks, allowing rainwater to enter.  After millions of years the small cracks have widened to become the canyons in the labyrinth.

Labyrinth Rocks

I’ll leave you with pictures of a memorial mosaic bench on the beach we found at a beach.  It seems to be made in the memory of a young woman who had passed away, by four friends.  It really was a work of art and incorporated commercial tiles, together with mosaics made from pottery, glass and beads.  You can imagine the time, effort, creative endeavor and love  these girls put in to making such a wonderful memory of their friend.

In memory of Kelly

The scenery is wonderful in this part of the country – we  are currently exploring the northern tip of the South Island, known as the Golden Bay area.  Have been here briefly some years ago, so it is great, this time, to take longer and have such a good look around.