Sunday January 22, 2012

This is my fourth day with Gregg Fletcher and Carla vanZon in Otaki, New Zealand. The following are a few highlights so far:  Yesterday I took a two hour walk right after getting up so I could explore the Otaki River a little. Gregg and Carla's place is a little more than a quarter mile from the river, which is comparable in size to the Pemi River where it flows through Lincoln. An obvious difference is that the Otaki does not have the big rocks and boulders that the Pemi has. Another larger difference is that this section of the river is only four miles from where it empties into the Pacific Ocean. There are striking hillsides and mountains that loom as backdrop to this majestic river, rising more than 5000'. I took many pictures of the wildflowers as I walked along. Then I had breakfast with Gregg and prepared for the work of the day which was mostly weeding out a heavily overgrown garden and my first bike ride to the sea with Carla for the small clams they call pipis. The surf was a bit rough and we needed to be almost waist deep to get out to the sandy beds. The temperature was in the high 70s and the water felt warmer, as the wind was steady from the west. Carla did well, dispite the surf, collecting a gallon of the pipis, and I managed to find a half dozen that weren't too small. Then a drink where we rendezvoused with Gregg at Emily's home near the beach who has a huge tepee in the backyard. Before leaving for the beach Gregg and Graham "PYRO" set and tested an LP gas canon that is mostly for flaring large shots of flame into the sky, a la Wiz of OZ style, that they will set up alongside the stage Gregg and I will build today for the live band that will perform at their big Cider Party next weekend. Just before we headed off on our bikes for the beach Emily and her friend Sarah and kids came by to deliver a surprise birthday gift for Carla of two grown geese. This was indeed a surprise and apparently welcome and enjoyed. The geese will live with the two dozen chickens alone side the six pigs in the orchard. We are in hopes that the large white goose "Max" will return as he had escaped about an hour before dusk when the neighbor's dog got after it and we could not find it before dark. It was a long and busy but enjoyable day. Carla added a beautiful hand painted silk scarf I hand brought her, made by my friend Paul Hudon's mother and artist Jeanne LaChance, to her collection of colorful wardrobe appointments. My first full day with Gregg he had decided that his five piglets needed prophylactic injections for worms and other bugs, and with my arrival making it possible to do this at home and save heaps of money on vet bills I was recruited to inject the serum while he held each of the screaming piglets in turn. This of course makes it sound like quite a simple process, and it is after you capture each little terrified porker and sit on top of the screamer so he can't so much as wiggle and cause some untoward harm to pig or pokers. Gregg has a pet pig "Hetti" who is native NZ pig, who is one of only two species with the chin tassels. She weights in over three hundred pounds and even though she could perhaps benefit from the same serum, Gregg wisely decided to forego her turn at the pig wrangling.
The day after this, Friday, we traveled the hour back into Wellington to get a few things done at Gregg and Carla's flat that they just rented out to a computer animator. He is working with a dozen other CGI puppeteers to complete the sci-fi special effects on the prequel to "Aliens" due for release this June. Then off to the airport to meet Carla who flew in from a week in Sydney. She is very tanned and on the go as usual, now with her trained focus on all the remaining preparations for the big "Cider Party". And on that note I will have to shift gears and do a little preparation of my own for today's stage building. Oh yeah and pick the strawberries, weed some more, look for the goose, and all the other farm surprises at Totaranui Orchard.