Down at the Beach

A couple of weeks ago I decided that two weeks in a hostel was probably enough and that I would move down to the beach for a change of scene for a few days before Jo arrives. This I have done today and I am now staying in a cabin in the holiday park at Waitarere (pronounced Whiter-Rarey) Beach. It seemed like a good idea at the time. But in the cold and rain of the New Zealand winter I can’t help but wonder why I left a place with a roaring fire every night and where the toilet wasn’t a hundred yards away across a muddy field for a small hut with cardboard walls and no heating.

The weeks big news is that Jo and I became home owners on Thursday. The house is completely empty, which is why I am not staying there, but if things don’t improve then I might change my mind.

Moaning about the cold aside (and it is winter here), I am pleased with how things are going. One of the most exciting things about relocating is that you get to try out all the different foodstuffs. I don’t mean fancy food; all the ordinary food is slightly different.

You don’t get Heinz baked beans here; Heinz own a Kiwi company called Watties who produce their own variety which is nothing like the real thing. The best brand of beans is, in my opinion, Oak and the worst is Pam’s. Basics is somewhere in between. I haven’t got round to SPC or Budget yet but I will in time.

There are different fruits to try. Obviously there’s the Kiwi fruit which I love (interestingly, the kiwi fruit isn’t native to New Zealand; it’s a Chinese Gooseberry). There’s also the Tomarillo (like a pear with a very strong tomato flavour - yuk) and the fijillo (just yuk).

There is a huge choice of beer for me to work my way through; so far my favourite is Speight’s. There are lots of bakeries in the towns here and the cakes they have are unbelievable; chocolate muffins with toffee centres topped with kit-kat, or Mars bar cake, butterscotch tart, chocolate pie. The cakes are a voyage of discovery in themselves.

So, this is how I have been amusing myself whilst I wait for my family to join me. Life in New Zealand is, for me, like an edition of Which? magazine.

Palmy Pimp Your Ride

Palmerston North is a city about 30 miles to the north of Levin. With a population of about 75,000 its not big place, but in New Zealand it counts as a proper city; its the largest town between Wellington and Hamilton, which is about 300 miles to the north. however, there isn’t a great deal going on here. Palmy is a student town and there are a lot of young people so it does have a certain buzzing kind of a vibe. It’s most noticable in the evenings when the boys bring their cars out. In Britain the teenage pose-mobile of choice is the ten year old souped up Vauxhall Corsa with fancy rear lights and shiny alloys. Things aren’t much different here but the cars are bigger, the exhausts are fatter and the rear spoilers are huge. Its quite fun really, but obviously I’m laughing at them, not with them. Some people, however, are obviously impressed. I’ve heard that the thing to do is to put a sign in the window that says Offers and your phone number. Then, if a lady sees your motor and she likes what she sees, she can call you up and tell you how impressed she is. The temptation to put up a sign in the Mazda is huge, but some things are not appropriate for a respectable married man in his thirties. I have managed to get out and about a bit in Palmy and I’ve been round the shops and down to the scenic river walk which is actually very pleasant. It has a bush reserve of native woodland and an area where they have installed a selection of Eucalyptus trees. It’s not terribly exciting though; about as exciting as Livingston and when we moved up there people were a bit snotty about it. Things improve in the surrounding countryside though. I teamed up with Tim from Canada and we went for a drive through the Manawatu Gorge, where the river has cut through the mountains. It’s the only way across the Tararua Ranges and the road is perilously perched on the edge of steep cliffs all the way. It twists and turns with the valley and you have to be a bit careful driving through it, especially as the scenery is quite distracting. There’s a huge and impressive windfarm on top of the hills and we walked the Gorge Trail, which runs through woodland over the mountains. It takes about four hours, so we called it a day after about 40 minutes of climbing the steep canyon and turned back. I’m starting to enjoy staying in the hostel, mostly because it’s nice to have a couple of friends to talk to. I am also amused by what goes on in the kitchens here, always a highlight of hostel living. There’s a man who eats nothing but cabbage and Tim bought seven tins of baked beans yesterday to see him through until tomorrow evening (apparently, they were a bargain!).

Two Weeks In New Zealand

It’s now over two weeks since I arrived in New Zealand and I am, I think, doing quite well. I have bought a car and I am buying a house and I have settled down in a backpacker’s hostel in Palmerston North whilst the purchase goes through. When I arrived in New Zealand I was determined to hit the ground running and now I am feeling rather pleased with myself.

Buying a car was easy. I don’t know anything about cars; as far as I can tell, one Japanese hatchback is much like another. So why worry about it? I bought a Mazda 323 and it seems to be a lovely car. I might have paid too much, but I might not and if I did, I’ll hopefully never find out about it.

Buying a house was a bit more stressful, although less so than in the UK. It could be argued that it is a bit rash to buy a house within two weeks of arriving in a new country, especially with Jo not having seen it. Certainly, my boss Tony thought I was barking mad when I started looking the day after arriving. However, we need to find somewhere to live and the quicker the better. I don’t fancy renting and having to move again and I don’t want to stay in an expensive caravan park for weeks if I can avoid it. More importantly, the dogs are arriving in 6 weeks and we need to have somewhere to put them.

The house is a lovely 1960’s bungalow (unusually) made of bricks, with a tin roof and it has been nicely done up inside with tiled floors and a new kitchen. It has a huge garden and a garage with a “sleep-out” at the back (effectively a spare bedroom). There’s also a vegetable garden (hooray!) and a shed (every house in New Zealand has at least one shed). I am soooo excited about it. The house will be ours on 24th August.

The thing I was most worried about when I came over was meeting Tony and staying with him and his family. It was very nice of him to ask but it was still a daunting prospect; I was terrified we’d fall out before I even started work, or that I would get drunk, say something stupid, lose all respect in his eyes and never be able to recover it. Fortunately, he and his family have turned out to be really nice and I was glad not to be alone.

Tony and Linda live on a “lifestyle” block a couple of miles outside Levin. A lifestyle block is a house in the countryside with a great big garden (Tony’s is 10 acres). Tony keeps cows and chickens and Linda has a miniature horse (the horse is called Smudge and looks cute, but has a tendency to head butt you). They live under the Tararua Ranges, the mountains that divide Levin from the east coast. The hills are often obscured by low cloud and mist, but on a clear evening they are stunningly lit up by the orange glow of the fading sun. The countryside around here looks gorgeous but I haven’t given myself the time to explore it yet. And besides, it’s rained most of the time since I’ve been here.

So, I’m just over two weeks into this adventure and there are just over two weeks before Jo and Lily get here. I must admit I can’t wait to see them both again. It’s been OK without them, but I’ve had a lot to think about. Now that the big things have been done, there isn’t so much to distract me from the fact that I am here on my own.