The Circle of Life (in New Zealand)

After our two weeks in Punakaiki we made our way down to Queenstown, with overnights in Franz Josef (staying at the Rainforest Retreat as a guest this time, which was surreal) and beautiful Wanaka. We arrived in Queenstown on December 3rd, and remained there since then.

Once we'd reached Queenstown, we went straight to Addstaff, the temp agency Mariah and I had worked for back in February. They got us both shifts for the following day, and since then we've been working various event staff and cleaning shifts, managing to break even in a town notorious for making your money disappear with dizzying speed.

It was awesome to be back -- especially since we were sleeping in a quiet van this time rather than a noisy 6-person dorm room. Being in Queenstown again reminded me that it really is my favorite place in New Zealand in terms of natural beauty. The weather was fantastic, although it is extremely odd to see Christmas decorations in the early summer.

After a 7-hour bus ride, I am now in Christchurch (thus completing my full NZ circle), and I'm leaving tomorrow afternoon for my first flight. As luck would have it, Kate (the other American wwoofer at Te Nikau) is also staying in Christchurch -- even more coincidentally, we're staying at the same hostel! So it's turned out to be a great first day of traveling home.

By the way, the scenery during the bus ride wasn't bad either:

I would say this is my last post for a while, but I happen to have a very exciting layover coming up that I am certain I'll be writing about.

Until then, it's all up in the air!

Thanksgiving in the Rainforest

We arrived in the little settlement of Punakaiki and were immediately amazed by the change in scenery. I've mentioned this before, but the diversity of the New Zealand landscape never ceases to surprise me. Coming from the dry, rolling hills of Murchison, the vivid green slopes of the West were about as shocking as it gets. We had officially entered the rainforest.

Our wwoofing placement was at a place called Te Nikau Retreat. It's a series of secluded lodges, all separated enough from each other that they felt truly isolated within the rainforest. Being a guest there would be fabulous.

This retreat somehow functions while completely depending upon unpaid work. The team of housekeepers is made up of only wwoofers, with only four paid staff members keeping things running. In other words, us wwoofers had loads of work to do every day -- always 4-5 hours of housekeeping work, not to mention the two extra hours of baking some mornings as well as cooking for up to ten people in the evenings. Te Nikau Retreat comes unpleasantly close to surpassing the 6-hour daily work limit wwoofers (or technically HelpX-ers, in this case) are supposed to have.

Luckily, our wwoofing team was awesome, and our disgruntled attitude at having been misled helped us all become fast friends. We managed to have a fun time joking about forming a "wwoofer's union" and sneaking tea breaks when the managers weren't looking. In other words, we turned a weird situation into something fun.

Another perk at Te Nikau Retreat was learning how to bake muffins and "German" bread (which, according to German wwoofer Shirley, is nothing like typical German bread). Cooking in the evenings was less fun and more burdensome, but once again we wwoofers came together to cook as a team every night, which defied the management's expectations of having one of us cook alone at a time. We were apparently "breaking all the rules," according to one manager.

I have to say, I did love the little community we'd formed in our cozy staff house, and the staff meals were a big part of that. Since two of us were American (the other one being Kate from Colorado, whom I bonded with early on when we assigned Harry Potter characters and places to the various people and locations of Te Nikau), our group decided to celebrate Thanksgiving altogether as a "family," something that I was indeed very grateful for. We even had pumpkin pie!

Kate and our glorious Thanksgiving meal.

By the end of our two weeks we had managed to do all sorts of cool things despite the frequent pouring rain. We left on a good note, vowing to see our friends Kate and Shirley again soon.

Horses outside the local tavern.

The only photo taken during the world's rainiest hike.

Dejan is so kneady.

Toby, the lazy rainforest cat.

Hunnah, the well-fed rainforest cat.

The musicians of the weekly jam session at the local tavern.

The pancake rocks.

Pancake rocks

The most famous of the pancake rocks

Pancake rocks

Pancake rocks

Near the pancake rocks

Wwoofing with Jenny (from the block)

Our week spent with Jenny in Murchison provided a refreshing change. We had our own little cottage and we were provided with dinner each night -- part of the reason I'd chosen Jenny's place was because of the reviews raving about her cooking, and we were not disappointed in the least.

I mostly helped Jenny with housekeeping for her three guest accommodation rooms, Dejan mostly shoveled horse poo (ha ha), but we also helped out with cobweb dusting (which seems to have become a horrifying trend in my life) and weeding out at her amazing other property by the river. During our ample free time we also went on several nature walks to explore the boundless beauty of the Murchison area.

"Downtown" Murchison

On one of the nearby nature walks.

Rupert, one of Jenny's super-friendly cats.

The second of the three cats.

Dejan hard at work.

Not a bad place to retire to, I'd say.

Jenny's pony, who would whinny until someone started petting her.

We're pals.

Another view from a nature walk.

Probably the best seat in the world.

Pano, courtesy of Dejan.

Photo op with Jenny!

One part of our stay in Murchison was totally unexpected. Military helicopters were flying over constantly and military vehicles were driving all over town, with uniformed soldiers in the back. There were troops were posted everywhere in this tiny town of less than a thousand. They stood in groups on street corners, they could be seen walking through people's front lawns, or setting up a post by placing their machine guns on various fixtures in town. Dejan and I were absolutely baffled. Had a war begun that we didn't know about? Was Murchison going through some sort of rebellion or attack?!?

Equally strange were the anti-army posters everywhere around town, as well as the unfamiliar flag posted on numerous doors, windows, and shop fronts. The military guys themselves were both shockingly young and extremely friendly. They also all seemed super bored. We greeted them with confused, giggling hellos and were rewarded with a hello and a chuckle in response.

(You can see the soldiers in the distance.)

The sign that greeted us on our way in.

Dejan's token pano.

Becara's flag.

Becara flag in the window, plus a "hostile" sign directed at the occupying Kiwi military.

More militants on the street corner.

Jenny informed us that this was a drill of sorts that happened regularly, but always in a different New Zealand location. Our timing was lucky that we were there within the couple of weeks that the town was "occupied." Troops from all over (from any countries with interests in the Pacific islands) joined together and essentially pretended they were carrying out a mission to restore peace in the fictional island nation called "Becara."

Residents of Murchison had been informed of the drill well in advance and were asked to greet the troops with hostility, as would likely happen in a similar real-life situation (there's more information on the drill here or the Facebook page called "Southern Katipo").

Of course, many of the Murchison townies decided to really commit to their role, staging protests and even "attacks" with water balloons. If only I had been a local, we could have taken part in the fun.

A Kiwi's version of acting hostile.

A protest emerges amongst growing political turmoil.

Things start getting heated.

Suddenly, violence erupts.

Oh, the carnage! (The rebel technology of water balloons can be seen here.)

The rebels were detained, disturbingly unashamed of their actions.

Note: all protest photos were taken from the Murchison Museum Facebook page. 

In the end, our time in Murchison was a bit more fascinating than we had initially anticipated. After our beautiful time with Jenny, we reluctantly departed for our next wwoofing spot: Punakaiki, next to Paparoa National Park on the West Coast.