Friday, October 16, 2009

A quick pictoral explanation of my trip south from Auckland, near the midpoint of the North Island, to a farm in Upper Moutere, near the North coast of the South Island:

The rather astonishing range of mountains we went through about three hours south of Auckland:
The bus driver pulled over for about ten minutes to let us have, as he put it, "a biff in the snow". I remained nonplussed.
(And here comes the requisite Mastercard commercial):Superwash merino fiber, from Fat Cat Knits on Etsy: $20
Spinning and plying to a fingering/sport weight: about 10 hours
Finishing knitting a pair of lovely, warm, squishy socks just in time for really cold feet on the bus ride: pretty darn good
Being That Kid who attempts to take pictures of her besocked and besandaled feet against the New Zealand backdrop on a very crowded double-decker bus: priceless.
The next morning, after a quick overnight in Wellington, I got up disgustingly early and hopped on the Interislander Ferry to Picton on the South Island. I was lucky enough to catch the sun breaking up the mist and the clouds over the sea:


After finally arriving in Upper Moutere, the view from my bedroom window:

(The little white things on the hill? Totally sheep. I am surrounded by sheep. I might be in heaven.)
And one of my favorite bits about this farm:

Baby goats!
This is Peony. She's trouble.

So, all in all, I am having a lovely time! I'll be out here in Upper Moutere until either Wednesday or Saturday, then I'm moving into Nelson proper for a while to work sorting and grading llama fiber for a felter. After that, who knows? It's all a big adventure!
And more baby goats, because I just can't help myself.

2 comments:

  1. Socks and Sandals - nice. Everyone was asking about you on tuesday. Squdge a goat for me!

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  2. Wow, they have a crapload of snow. For some reason I picture NZ being kind of tropical.
    I'm clearly geographically illiterate.

    Goats rule!

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