Over the hills and far away

It's been a long time since I took Mangapai Caves Road through to the caves.  When I turned off down the road yesterday it wasn't with any intent other than revisit a drive I hadn't done for a while.  At the corner of Graham Road I decided I'd go that way, I don't think I've ever been up that road before.  

My timing for meandering along an unsealed metal (gravel) road was perfect.  There's been just enough rain to pack down the metal leaving a relatively smooth surface.  The road twists and turns ever upwards.  At least it did when I decided to turn back and return to complete the trip another day when I've remembered to visit the loo before I set out.  There are no public amenities out here.   

I only passed two vehicles and could stop often to take in the views.  This one is looking inland towards the hills of home:

From a different spot looking east, towards the harbour

I know I can't be relied upon to take photos of a straight horizon and I struggled to straighten this shot until I settled on the tree in the foreground.  I just hope it has grown straight as the wind would be a bit fierce on these hills.

When I first came to New Zealand all those years ago green, hilly country like this used to freak me out.  Literally.  I couldn't sleep at night  in hilly countryside.  I'd dream that those hills were closing in on me and wake up panicked, feeling I couldn't breath. (Isn't it weird that you add a k to panic to make the past tense?)  I'd yearn for the wide open harsh dry flat countryside of Queensland's north west.

Now I can't imagine living anywhere else.

Fences with purpose

A fence to keep them in:

Fences to keep them out.

Linking to Teresa's Good Fences.

Straight to the top.

I must not let my amusement interfere with my mission to elicit an apology from New Zealand Qualifications Authority for helping themselves to one of my photos.

I received a prompt response to my email.  What I call a drafting gate letter where the help desk decides in which direction to send the complaint.  

While I'm in a bad mood I might add I'm not impressed by the reply which was signed by V.  That's right, V.  If the drafting gate people can't even identify themselves I don't hold much hope of anyone accepting responsibility.  

So what caused the amusement you might ask?  The drafting gate person decided my complaint should be handled by the Executive Assistant to the Deputy Chief Executive Qualifications.  I wonder what jumped up self important personage holds that title?  I'm just being nasty now.  Venting as the young ones would say.  I'd hazard a guess the title is the best part of the job.  Probably some harassed, under paid, overworked well meaning person trying to earn a living in the  bureaucratic BS that is the tertiary education sector, trying to sort out the stuff ups of their seniors.    

In other news, the rain has stopped.  There was a lot of it and more is predicted.  The sun is shining, there's a stiff breeze to dry out the puddles.  If I weren't in a grump it would say it's a lovely day.  Oh, what the hell, it is a lovely day.  I'll put my bad mood on hold until I get a response from ... who was it? That's right, the Executive Assistant to the Deputy Chief Executive.  

Update: 
I have to put my cynicism aside and offer bouquets to NZQA for the blinding efficiency with which they handled my complaint.  Obviously, the drafting gate person on the help desk forwarded it to correct Executive Assistant who forwarded it to the correct Team Leader who explained that NZQA has an exemption under the Copyright Act 1994. 

It makes sense that examination material must be confidential until the exams are sat lest they be compromised.  So they are allowed to use material even when it is copyrighted and permission is not necessary.

I still think for the sake of good manners they should find a way to inform the source of the material and have so responded.

I guess in some ways I'm still a dreamer.

The cheek!

I'm trying to find a way to politely explain that I'm a tad annoyed with the New Zealand Qualification Authority.  A friend from my days working in the tertiary education sector has drawn to my attention that a photo from my blog has been used in an examination paper.  No, not with my permission.  A few times in the past people have contacted me requesting to use one of my photos and I've been only too happy to agree and have been chuffed to see my photo in a book or on the cover of a CD.  This time I can't even see which photo they used as they have had the good grace to print "For copyright reasons, this resource cannot be reproduced here." when the exam paper appeared on their website.

So, my mission for today is to make my displeasure known to the NZQA.  I've given up trying to get through by phone so will have to put it in writing.  I know that putting photos on my blog and doing nothing to protect myself from copyright infringements leaves me open to such things happening.  And I know NZQA would not have profited by it but I think it is just rude considering, from the exam question, that the photo was used as an example of poor farm drainage.  The bloody cheek is what I really think!

So, now I will finish that letter and then do something about adding copyright to my photos.

Corby

It's that sort of day.  I feel like curling up in sunshine.  Trouble is, there's no sun.  So I will settle for a comfy chair and a book.

Lately I've been choosing one 'wild card' book each time I go to the library.  Taking home an author I've not heard of or read before.  This time it was Ian R MacLeod.  Oh darn, I've just looked again and it is fantasy.  

I'll give it a go and if I can't cope (which I usually can't with fantasy writing) I'll do some to knitting.  

It feels like the first day of winter.  

Kaipara fences

A couple of weeks ago I stopped in again at the Kaipara Coast Plant Centre along SH 16 on my way to Auckland.

These are a few more gates positioned so they work as fences.

And a few random art works:

I really liked this and should have got out of the car to get a better angle as it was positioned  above my head.  It is titled "The weathermen".

I'll link to Teresa's Good Fences.

Home again, home again, jiggety jig

Don't get me wrong, I love visiting Taranaki, my daughter and her family and the visits on my way down there and coming back with my other daughter.  But nothing beats coming home again, the comfort of the familiar sights and routines. And attending a stretch class.  How my body misses those strenuous stretch classes.  No matter how hard I try on my own I don't push myself like I do in class.  And I do so enjoy the company of the other ladies who attend this class.  This morning, from my position on the floor I could see out the door, across the lawn and burial ground of the marae to the other side of the harbour.  Who could ask for more?

I flew down to Taranaki on a very early flight, leaving Auckland in the dark and watching day break along the way. 

  Mt Ruapehu in the distance.  It sits in the middle of the island, roughly 250 kms from the coast. 

 I should have known from the strong colours in the sky that morning that rough weather was ahead.

But why worry about what can't be changed when there is a beautiful early morning to enjoy?  The morning was still and clear, the sun just starting to touch the tops of trees along the roadside.  No snow on Mt Taranaki as yet.  It's been unseasonally warm lately.

It wasn't long before the rough weather moved in and the mountain, which can most times be seen from this spot, is hiding behind the fog and mist.

Not that I cared too much about the weather.  I had a lovely visit with the family.  And when I went down to the harbour to take another photo this morning it had started to cloud over and now it is raining here.  Well, trying to rain.  

Kaipara Coast

When I was travelling back from Auckland with my five year old grandson a couple of weeks ago I decided to take a stop at the Kaipara Coast Sculpture Garden Centre to give Aiden a change to stretch his legs and for me to try the coffee at the cafe which I haven't visited before.

The coffee was so so but the childrens play area was excellent.  I was ready to move on long before Aiden was which gave me a chance to wander around the plants.  The staff in the cafe were lovely saying he'd be fine there by himself and they would keep an eye on him for me.  

There's a sculpture trail at the centre.  I will call in sometime when I have time for the 1 km walk. The artwork on the gates and fences give an indication of what to expect.                       

I'll come back to link to Theresa's Good Fences.

That's a lot of stringers?

I had such a laugh yesterday after my friend, Chris said, "Have you seen Roger's new stringers?" and I walked around the corner of the surfboard factory to see a mini forest of logs.

Surfers will know that the stringer is the thin strip of wood that traditionally runs down the middle of the surfboard. The wood is typically made of balsa, although this is poplar, and the thickness increases the strength and rigidity of the board. Some boards have multiple stringers for added stiffness.   Here's a shot of a board with its single stringer that I lifted from Roger's Surfline website. 

 .

You've got to agree there are a lot of stringers there waiting to be integrated into surfboards of the future. 

A couple of locals

A roadside fence just up the road a bit.

The old shed is some distance from the road.  I take a photo every now and then to see how much it has deteriorated.  Soon it will disappear from the landscape.

If it weren't for Theresa's Good Fences I would not have taken a photo all week.

Patience Pill

This is another draft post that I discovered.  It gave me a smile remembering when my three grand-daughters were much younger, how they used to test my patience.  But I really wish I could turn back time!

I need a patience pill. Yeah, I know. I should take one daily and just take a booster when I'm child minding.

Early morning I was doing well. Three little girls were dressed, brushed and fed, school lunches prepared, school bags packed in good time. They were even ready 10 minutes early. I think that might have been when the wheels fell off. I agreed they could watch TV for a few minutes. Seemed reasonable. Having the TV on in the morning had never been heard of when my kids were their age but, hey, I can cope with change. Trouble was, Shayde decided to go outside and kick a ball around instead, so when I went into the lounge to tell them to get their bags it's time to go, she was nowhere to be found.

Yesterday morning I was unpopular for sending them off five minutes before they thought they should be leaving so I wasn't making that mistake again. No, this morning when I said "Time to go" the big hand was pointing straight up at the 12, not a tad either side, straight up. But it was creeping around a bit by the time we found the ball kicker and she retrieved her bag from where she couldn't remember leaving it.

So Shayde is finally out the door, Georgia is waiting for her and Shayde says, "Where's Krystal?" She's is standing in the middle of the yard looking around for her, bouncing that cursed ball again. Krystal is located hiding behind a a bush. Geez!

"Put the ball down and get a move on."
"But I'm taking it to school."
"You are not, you're not taking a ball on the bus, there are plenty of balls at school, put it down."
"But, but."
"Do I have to put a cracker under your tail to get you moving?"

Finally they meander off down the hill towards the road.

A couple of minutes later are meandering back up the hill as the school bus is disappearing along the road.

I'm not known for my patience but I was still doing well at this stage. After all I don't have any pressing engagements or anything. Nothing wrong with a drive to the school and back. And the girls had the good sense to realize missing the bus was their own fault and were now on their best behaviour so there were no cross words during the trip.

I was quite looking forward to driving back home, by myself, admiring the countryside. Lovely day with that clear shining you get after rain. Until, there had to be an until, didn't there? Until I came up behind another car going my way.

Now this is a rather unusual happening for me. The little girls tell me I drive slowly but that is just in comparison to their parents and the majority of other locals. I no longer think I have to get wherever I'm going quickly. The thing is I know I don't drive as fast as most other users of our road and I know what the rear view mirror is for. And I pull over to allow low flyers to be on their way.

This morning's fellow traveller had obviously never driven down this road before and was approaching every corner with trepidation. Which is wise; there are a few nasties along the way. And maybe he wasn't accustomed to driving on a dirt road. Obviously he felt uneasy about one lane bridges. One such bridge is on a slight bend and he came to a stop before lining it up and creeping forward on to it. That was my patience pill. It was so bizarre I had to laugh. The thought crossed my mind that maybe he was checking to make sure there was no Billy Goat Gruff.

I also decided after that maybe it would be best if he didn't remember he had a rear view mirror and take his eyes off the road!

Lunch time

I discovered the 'Drafts' button in Blogger dashboard.  I know, I know, it's probably been there all along.  I knew there were a few drafted blog posts sitting there and was surprised when I clicked on the just discovered button that there are 12 of them.  

This one is from about a year ago. 

I had lunch with the ladies from the Tai Chi class, a pleasant, cheerful bunch.

Came home and the cows were being fed the haylage they love. 

Today the cows are in that same paddock opposite my house.  It's getting to the tail end of the milking season.  These girls make up the much reduced herd that is still being milked. 

Floundering

Thank you, Pondside, for a comment you left on a recent blog post which reminded me of a similar misadventure years ago. 

It was in winter in the late 80s or early 90s.  I was keeping company with a lovely man from Mangawhai, not far from where I lived.  During the summer months we had enjoyed going floundering at night.  Let me rephrase that – we enjoyed night-time flounder fishing the old fashioned away, with a spear. 

We would wade in shallow water as quietly as possible along the estuary armed with a light held close to the surface of the water.  The flounder is a flat fish which come into very shallow water - sometimes only inches deep - after sunset.   Stalking shallow beach water and estuarine areas by night offers a totally different dimension to fishing. The fish life can be prolific, with mullet, eels and other creatures of the night more common than the skittish flounder, which can be difficult to see, camouflaged against the sand.    When the light is shone on the flounder, they stay very still and should make an easy target.  Well, you’d think it would be easy.  More fun than easy really.  Many flounder lived to swim another day.

When the nights became cooler my companion, Allan, applied himself to thinking up a way we could still go floundering without having our feet in cold, cold water for hours.  He came up with a lamp that operated under water (maybe it was battery operated, I can’t remember) which we could suspend from the front of his kayak.  It worked well.  In theory.  In practise, I found it difficult to gauge the depth of the water while seated in the kayak rather than knowing how far up the legs it came while wading.  I thought I was getting the hang of it when I spotted a BIG flounder and thrust the spear at it.  However, the spear (with me holding on to the end of it) travelled much deeper into the water than I thought it would and I became unbalanced and we tipped into the freezing water.  OK, just very cold.  But far too cold for me.  I screamed and shrieked and then we laughed and laughed as we hurriedly hauled in the kayak, got it on to the car and headed home for a much needed change of clothes and some warmth.  

In those days Mangwhai had a permanent population of about 600 (which was much larger during the summer months) and houses close to where we had lunched the kayak were all holiday homes.  No lights, no-one around.  So we presumed no-one was aware of our misadventure.

A week or so later we were visiting friends who lived on the cliff above the estuary but quite some distance from where we had been.  After a while the man said we should have been at their place during the week.  He and his wife had been watching TV when they heard a blood curdling scream above the sound of the TV.  It came from down on the water and they were alarmed, wondering what on earth was going on down there.  They thought someone was having their throat cut or something equally terrible.  But after a while they heard laughter and voices.  They thought the laughter sounded familiar but hadn’t been able to work out who it belong to.  Allan and I didn’t say a word but must have exchanged a look, or a smile because they then remembered whose laugh it was they had heard.  We had forgotten how sound travels on the water on a still night.  

I know Allan reads my blog.  Do you remember that night, Allan?  Good times!