After zipping past the west coast and resort towns, I made it to the highly recommended and much-awaited farm that was to be my last in NZ. The sense of community from young, like-minded peers was what I craved and lacked from my other farming experiences, and in my mind this was going to be full of communal food-making, drumming and hippy free love times. When I got to the farm, the owner Shaun gave me a hearty welcome. My first impression of the farm seemed fine, but then the faces of the other wwoofers made me blink.
Why did everyone look so ... disgruntled? Where was the free hippy spirit I had idealistically imagined?
Turns out that the couple owning the farm had recently split up, leaving the guy in charge of running the farm, the wwoofers and a part-time job to supplement the income. Also left him with some emotional baggage, which wasn't helped by the fact that the woman still handled the emails and he had to keep explaining her absence.
Hmm, potentially awkward situation noted. Still, things don't seem that bad. So why does my caravan roommate from HK look like she's about to break down? In Cantonese she explains that there's no heating and the night before it was so cold she hadn't slept a wink. Yikes. Despite her grievances and willingness to hurl the whole concept of wwoofing down the toilet, I decided I had to try things out for myself, and figured it would go over a bit better since I was more used to country life. As it turned out, there were lots of ups and downs, but it was an experience in itself that I'm glad happened.
My theory is that at the core of the unpleasant things we experienced was the breakup. I guess the woman had previously been in charge of the household and the wwoofers' survival and happiness, whereas with Shaun we noticed throughout the week that he possibly had an impression of us as wussies (complaints about the cold) and rabid greedy children (continually asking for more food staples from the pantry).
The biggest problem was there were too many people. Wairuna Farm was 10 acres and the land needed a lot of helping hands, but with the delicate situation in the house and only one man to take care of everything, it was way too crowded. Our highest wwoofer count one night was fourteen people! This place was used to high turnover.
The heating could've boosted morale, but nothing doing. Nights indeed were cold, and luckily I managed to forage for some extra sleeping bags and blankets. It was basically camping. Nobody would've noticed it in summer, which is when my friend had wwoofed there, but now in mid-March, fall was approaching fast.
But on to the positives! Indeed, everybody wore the same "what the hell am I doing here" face for about a day and a half, but it was because we were all adjusting at the same time. Over the week we slowly got to know each other and created that communal vibe I sorely needed, over rigorous rounds of Bananagrams (FINALLY), a sweaty game of ultimate, and of course over FOOD! Oh man. First of all, Shaun was a really good cook and there were big heaps of all the different courses (SO much zucchini). Second, in our group there were backgrounds of French, Italian, Chinese, German, Belgian and American, meaning lots of diverse food being shared at a long dinner table. In one day we had tons of amazing bread made by French baker Julien, with Italian Luca overseeing the pizza party. Another night me and Lee were put to the task of doing something with all the bok choi, so we scraped together an Asian dinner.
What else was good? All the animals had funny quirks and were big softies, especially when given affection, and weeding was less tedious with others to talk to. I was selected to be the Vanna White at our Farmer's Market stall in Dunedin, which required a wakeup time of 4am in the brisk and dark night, but involved a lot of fun selling veggies and ogling all the amazing food in and around the railway station.
For St. Patrick's Day all of us wwoofers went into "town" to celebrate, which meant going to the only bar/restaurant in Clinton (there's no proper supermarket but oh boy do they have a taxidermist) and watching the local young rednecks get completely plastered by 9:30pm. One of those big boys had ripped his shirt down the middle, and as he was drunkenly trying to talk to us, his equally intoxicated friend hunched beside him, trying to keep a steady hand so he could light his ripped shirt on fire. Good show.
Things were getting much better despite some difficult living conditions, but unfortunately the last straw came when one wwoofer accidentally flooded a greenhouse, sucking all the water out of the pump and leaving us an afternoon deprived of drinking or cleaning water. Anyway, for me one week was enough to enjoy myself and not mind the conditions. After the weekend, 8 of us out of the 12 hightailed it out of there and went our separate ways.
Me and Lee went with Belgian Daniel down to the nearby Catlins Reserve for a short but awesome nature roadtrip. It's a scenic drive along the southeast coast of the island, chock full of bays, coves, waterfalls and wondrous marine creatures. Despite all the stops, we covered half the way on the first day. Of special note was Nugget Point, a lookout with rock boulders strewn about in the sea; Parakanui Falls, a serene multi-tiered waterfall; and Jack's Blowhole, fantastic not just for the innuendo but also for the sheer power of water traveling 200 meters inland to crash against an enclosed rock wall.
We slept luxuriously in Waikawa that night (luxury meaning warm and comfy beds after the farm), and in the morning spent ages at Porpoise Bay taking in the view of giant ribbons of seaweed whipping about in the surging waves while clinging to the rockbeds filled with petrified wood. Both Porpoise and nearby Curio Bay were also prime locations for dolphin spotting, so we kept our eyes peeled.
No dolphins, so our next stop was to gorgeous but furiously windy Slope Point, the southern most point of the south island, and then to Waipapa Point, which had a lighthouse but much more importantly gigantic sea lions. Apparently some people from our hostel said the sea lions were frolicking and kissing each other the day before, but that day we appeared to have stumbled upon their naptime. Lumpy but still cute; Chinese analogies translated would've pegged them as "logs of wood" or "clumps of rice". Being potential killers, we didn't try to rouse them for our own amusement, so we had a nap ourselves on the sunny and less windy side of the hill.
Later Lee woke us up because it was time for her to hitch back to Owaka, where her hostel was booked. So we drove back to Curio, let her off, and me and Daniel parked the car at the campground. We vainly tried to dolphin watch again but gave up and headed over to Porpoise Bay, for it was time to catch a glimpse of yellow-eyed penguins coming back from the sea to their nests.
As the sun started to set, slowly the first penguin appeared, however it was a bit awkward because of all the gawking humans blocking his path. But he was a pro, and after an extended period of preening and posing for pictures, he decided enough was enough and hopped and waddled his way through the crowd. A few more arrived also rather slowly but very close to us, making it a total of four that we saw before it got too dark and cold. We headed back and celebrated our day's successes by having dinner in the back of the car. Sleep was in the back of the car too, although neither of us got much what with the space constraints.
No matter, because the next morning was our last chance for spotting a dolphin. We parked ourselves on the beach and waited. Finally we saw in the far distance one or two black things bobbing in the water, so we made haste and ran into the ocean. BRRRR! I didn't get very far because even though the water was waist deep, some of the waves crashed over my head. Daniel went further out but after awhile we couldn't see those black bobs anymore, so got out and dried off. Oh well. It was still a successful mission, full of raw nature, seals, sea lions, penguins and a 50% possibility of a dolphin sighting...and all for free!
Oh and at some point we got quite silly:
Same afternoon as the 'dolphin swim', we drove to Bluff for some disappointing oysters (no comparison to Canada) before Daniel dropped me off to hitch to nearby Gore. The next morning I started hitching towards Mt. Cook, which was 300km north on the inland highway and almost half the length of the south island. I knew it was ambitious so I decided to stick my thumb out and go as far as I could get that day. This hitch definitely had more a sense of adventure and randomness than before. Highlight was the huge ice cream a sweet couple in their 80's bought for me. Lowlight was late in the afternoon when one guy dumped me on the side of the road across from his house, and the few cars that drove by weren't biting. However, in my desperate hour of need, a camper van came rolling by with no passengers (what luck!) and the girl's destination was all the way to Mt. cook. We stopped at a lookout to take pictures of a lake and who should stop beside us were Nicola and Santi, friends from Wanaka and Qtown. Seriously! 7pm, middle of nowhere. I guess I shouldn't be surprised by these things anymore.
As we rolled in to Mt. Cook, we couldn't help but feel awe at the expanse of mountains surrounding us. Couldn't say the same for the village though, which was nothing but a few areas of pricey accommodation. In the morning me and Nicola do a short but sweet walk through Hooker Valley (freebie) towards a milky lake filled with what look like animal ice sculptures. Actually, the mountainous landscape was very similar to British Columbia, although the difference is here you have to do a lot less work to see it.
Later on we grabbed our stuff and hitched to Lake Tekapo to spend the quiet night there. The next morning we run into Santi and drive together to the Akaroa penninsula, just off of Christchurch on the east coast. Akaroa itself is a charming French village (due to French settlers) with streets that start with 'Rue', although I'm sure they're pronounced very differently by Kiwis. The sun was shining and our hostel was extremely cute, fit with a dog named Pongo that was bigger than me. Definitely the perfect place to relax for three days.
Me, Nicola and Dutch Jellis do our best to have a very French afternoon, bikeriding along the beach (me humming 'foo de fa fa' from Flight of the Conchords) and having a baguette picnic on the grass. That night we went across the street to an aptly named 'end of summer' party to hear a bluegrass band play on the porch of an outdoor cafe/bar called the Stables. Nicola left the next day, so me and Jellis spent a chill day walking, eating and lazing in the sun. More Bananagrams that night.
Then it was time to say goodbye and hitch to the confusingly sprawled streets of Christchurch. Stayed with a friend of a friend of a friend Louise, had a good soak on my daytrip up to Hanmer Springs, then back to Louise's again. In Christchurch, there are lots of empty or damaged buildings. It's a slow recovery but at least there are still lots of people. It was sad to see the few old churches destroyed, especially since New Zealand, like Canada, is so new there isn't much historical architecture to boast about. There was some interesting development coming out of the earthquake though, with one small strip of shops and cafes made of shipping containers. Very modern, hip and colorful, and a great use of recycling.
Louise's cool mom drove me to my flight bound for Auckland, and I stayed with sister's friends Jessica and Dan for the weekend. It was Jess's birthday that Saturday, so there was a big feast and afterwards even bigger bellies to show for it. Those two were great hosts and troopers for driving me at 5:30am to the airport, where I had to give a sad floppy wave to New Zealand, before boarding for its bigger and supposedly more crass neighbor (sound familiar?).
The verdict? Coming to New Zealand was one of the best things I ever did for myself. I realized last month that on this trip I've grown so much and yet haven't felt this young at heart in a long time. After spending 5 months in this beautiful country and being totally independent, I feel more myself than I ever have before. I think my routine back home was dulling my sense of adventure, curiosity and self more than I really knew. I was close to wasting my mid-20's in a directionless zombie state, and it was here that I relcaimed the essence of Joey.
Now I'll go home refusing to settle for 'good enough', and hopefully be able to carve my way and be free not just on vacation, but in real life.
OH WAIT PSYCHE! I ain't going home yet. Mwahahahahaha!
Awesome, traveling will broaden your horizon, will bring lots of inspiration to your life; coming back to real life is totally different, waiting to see how you can incorporate what you have learnt in your trip down the road.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, these 5 months will be in your memory and our memories forever.
Good job!