Mariah and I were very excited to get started on a small beef and deer farm in Cust, a town not too far from Christchurch. We were staying with Maria and Mark, a lovely Kiwi couple. We felt right at home with them, and Maria trusted us to feed the animals on our own on the first day!
The best part about this whole thing, of course, was the animals. SUCH CUTIES!
There were 30 deer, 12 steers, 28 6-month-old calves, an obese pot-bellied pig, two sheep, a couple chickens, and some cats. All of the animals had names, and all of them were extremely friendly. Sometimes too friendly--while feeding the steers once, we had a stampede on our hands. Dotty, the "alpha male" of the steers, even put down his head and went for Mariah! We whacked them in the noses and shouted a lot, which seemed to work, but for a city girl it was a shocking (and hilarious) experience.
Lisa, with her mom "Lamby" in the background.
They thought my hands were cow treats, so they "attacked."
To finish things off, on one of our last days there we went to a town festival of sorts. It was absolutely tiny, which made it even more fun: everyone wanted to know where we were from, who we were staying with, and why we were there. We befriended a couple of the musicians (besides Mark, who was entertaining the "crowd" with his accordion skills) and were the only ones loudly cheering them on after each piece.
We were sad to leave these friendly critters behind (not to mention Mark and Maria, who were absolutely amazing to stay with), but you know how it goes: we have to keep moooooving.
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