Well, here are some updates. First: Joey, Scooter, and I went to Boutique Beach, a tournament in Hawke’s Bay. It was a hat tournament with 6 teams, 6-7 people per team. The level of ultimate was mediocre at best, with several people coming to play for the first time in their lives, but still fun. The beach lets you throw your body around plenty so even though the skills were shitty, we all got to lay out grab/d enough to make it fun. I however pulled a back muscle on Sunday, which left me pretty much in the prone position for hours. I finally managed to do a little standing and walking, and after several more days, am mostly back to normal. Has been a frustrating and somewhat painful recovery though. Reminiscent of my back injuries in the spring of 2007, I place blame on my throwing lots and lots of hard-as-I-can hucks post-tournament play on Saturday. But I’m getting caught up in the tournament. I’ll write about that later.
Second: Cyle is currently being fixed. Joey and I at the reins, we managed to transfer the mechanical breakdown insurance that Previous Owner had on Cyle to our name (my name) and successfully file a claim. This procedure all came about because we needed to figure out how not to the pay the $1500-2000 expected fee for putting in a second-hand motor to fix a broken cam shaft. As it turns out, the whole thing will likely cost $2400, with Drive Right, the insurer, picking up $1750 of the tab. A win, we think. Now, Joey and I are simply waiting for the job to be completed.
Third: Here’s where we’re waiting. Stuck in Hawke’s Bay after the tournament, me with a bad back, Joey and I explored some options. Initially, he though he might work on the vineyard again with Scoot, but that kinda left me screwed, since there might not be work for me, and my back sucked, so he abandoned that, which was very considerate. We ended up spending a day in Napier, figuring stuff out and letting me rest for a day. We crashed at a nice enough hostel for two nights, and decided to try and find a local solution, since the beach neighborhood wasn’t too bad. We decided to email pretty much all the reasonable WWOOFing spots in the area, and got a positive response (as well as many many negative ones). The place we got hooked up with is a B & B near Waipukurau. It’s a sweet gig actually, we work from 8 to 1 roughly each day, and have the rest of the time off to use the amenities of a luxury B & B (tennis courts, billiard table, pool, fruit trees, beach, etc.). It has been a comfortable and cheap way to spend the week while we finished the details with Cyle. We are not waiting out his rebirth. Also, there is a wedding here tomorrow, which will be fun to see/be a part of.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
Hostesses, Volcanoes, and Car Trouble
Benjamin is well in the lead with hook ups on places to stay this trip. He found the Milnes, who have been hugely generous, and thanks to Baxi, met Linda, who has been an incredible mom away from home. First off, she and her husband Barry let us stay at their house for two nights in soft comfy beds. They also fed us three huge dinners (lasagna, roast with vegetables, steak and potatoes), gave us breakfast of museli and toast, and sent us hiking with sandwiches and apples. As if that weren’t enough, they let us stay, alone, at their beach house for a night where we enjoyed a quiet and beautiful day swimming and laying on the warm sand. Linda also mentioned some other places where she had some relatives that might host us. Wow.
We just hiked a couple of volcanoes in the past few days. First, Mount Taranaki, which is 2500 meters tall and a challenging climb with stunning cloudy views. Then, two days later, we hiked the Alpine Crossing between Mt. something or other and Mt. Rupaehu, the first half of which was fantastic, with completely new to me volcanic landscape reminiscent of Martian photos and some crazy sulfuric vents and yellow green pools. We also saw some fantastic lava flows, and some wild red rock formations. Pictures can be seen at the picasa site (http://picasaweb.google.com/HenryRScharf/)
Unfortunately our car, affectionately named Cyle Van Rockin, has fallen ill. He wouldn’t start up at the car park, and we eventually had him towed (thanks to my nearly expired AAA membership) to Owhango, a tiny place 55km away with a service station. Evidently the trouble is with the cam shaft, and now we’re hiding in a tiny motel room where we are allegedly one person, waiting to find out the damage with Cyle. Here’s hoping it’s a small fix.
We just hiked a couple of volcanoes in the past few days. First, Mount Taranaki, which is 2500 meters tall and a challenging climb with stunning cloudy views. Then, two days later, we hiked the Alpine Crossing between Mt. something or other and Mt. Rupaehu, the first half of which was fantastic, with completely new to me volcanic landscape reminiscent of Martian photos and some crazy sulfuric vents and yellow green pools. We also saw some fantastic lava flows, and some wild red rock formations. Pictures can be seen at the picasa site (http://picasaweb.google.com/HenryRScharf/)
Unfortunately our car, affectionately named Cyle Van Rockin, has fallen ill. He wouldn’t start up at the car park, and we eventually had him towed (thanks to my nearly expired AAA membership) to Owhango, a tiny place 55km away with a service station. Evidently the trouble is with the cam shaft, and now we’re hiding in a tiny motel room where we are allegedly one person, waiting to find out the damage with Cyle. Here’s hoping it’s a small fix.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Cwmglyn Farm - WWOOF #1
Today is Sunday, and since Monday night I have been here at Cwmglyn farm WWOOFign with Ben Gray. Basically what that means is, in exhange for food, shelter, and knowledge of organic farming (in this case, of organic Dairy farming) we work for 4-6 hours a day doing simple things like yard work, cooking, and cleaning. On Tuesday morning, our first whole day, we totally took apart the milk shed where Emily and Molly are milked daily and washed down the walls, shelves, floors, buckets, containers, and tools and put it all back together again. It took us roughly 4-5 hours to do, and then we made some dinner. This was a heavy day to be sure, but it was something of an audition day in my opinion, and we proved ourselves well. We took the rest of the night off beginning around 7:30 and relaxed in our spacious library that contains my bed and connects to Ben’s bedroom.
The next morning we awoke refreshed and ready to do some more work. Colin had us unearth some large stumps which though tipped on their side, had succumb to the dirt left on the roots and the quick New Zealand vegetation growth. It was tough but fun work to dig, then pry up, and then knock clean the giant stumps. By noonish we finished and went in to have lunch and begin a giant batch of stew, which would feed the four of us dinner that night, and Ben and I again the next day. With the pot simmering on the stove, we were given the rest of the day off and used it to go for a run in the countryside. The heat finally made me walk-run the last mile home, but Ben finished all 4.5 miles or so that we attempted over the rolling paddock-filled hills. We threw for a few minutes among the trees in one of the farm’s paddocks and felt our quads protest. It was a well needed run, especially with our high milk fat diet here. A shower, some puzzle work, and a couple card games took up the rest of our afternoon.
A note about our residence here on the farm. We live in a second house, connected to the newer main building by a hallway. Our house has a pool table, a huge library of fiction and non-fiction, and four separate beds. It also has a stereo of mediocre but well distributed sound. At first, our only real input was radio, but we finally put it together that Ben’s tape adaptor could give us iPod connectivity. In here we tend to play cards, read, nap, put puzzles together, and so on. It’s a relaxed study-like place that is nice and quiet when we want it to be, and much nicer than our former abode. It should also be noted that while we have earned no money this week, we have had to think about money the same amount.
We finished up our stay with some steaks one night, hack pizza the next, and my first ever attempt at Stroganoff, though with venison instead of beef. All went well. When Joey and Scooter finally came to pick us up, they stayed one night, and then we said goodbye in the morning after some pancakes. Colin and Biddy wished us well and told us to stop in if we were in the neighborhood again.
The next morning we awoke refreshed and ready to do some more work. Colin had us unearth some large stumps which though tipped on their side, had succumb to the dirt left on the roots and the quick New Zealand vegetation growth. It was tough but fun work to dig, then pry up, and then knock clean the giant stumps. By noonish we finished and went in to have lunch and begin a giant batch of stew, which would feed the four of us dinner that night, and Ben and I again the next day. With the pot simmering on the stove, we were given the rest of the day off and used it to go for a run in the countryside. The heat finally made me walk-run the last mile home, but Ben finished all 4.5 miles or so that we attempted over the rolling paddock-filled hills. We threw for a few minutes among the trees in one of the farm’s paddocks and felt our quads protest. It was a well needed run, especially with our high milk fat diet here. A shower, some puzzle work, and a couple card games took up the rest of our afternoon.
A note about our residence here on the farm. We live in a second house, connected to the newer main building by a hallway. Our house has a pool table, a huge library of fiction and non-fiction, and four separate beds. It also has a stereo of mediocre but well distributed sound. At first, our only real input was radio, but we finally put it together that Ben’s tape adaptor could give us iPod connectivity. In here we tend to play cards, read, nap, put puzzles together, and so on. It’s a relaxed study-like place that is nice and quiet when we want it to be, and much nicer than our former abode. It should also be noted that while we have earned no money this week, we have had to think about money the same amount.
We finished up our stay with some steaks one night, hack pizza the next, and my first ever attempt at Stroganoff, though with venison instead of beef. All went well. When Joey and Scooter finally came to pick us up, they stayed one night, and then we said goodbye in the morning after some pancakes. Colin and Biddy wished us well and told us to stop in if we were in the neighborhood again.
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