Rain

We’ve been amazingly lucky with the weather ever since we came away, over a month ago now. Today was the first day in all that time there was any appreciable rain -- as we drove down to Whakatane on the Bay of Plenty.

Very English-type scenario for much of the trip with lots of cloud above green fields and hills. Rain persisted for much of the time so we abandoned eating out on the evening and opted for microwave meal in our excellent motel room, opening our private bar (obtained by us at supermarket) a tad early at 5.0 pm. Sorry 6.50 pm, honest. Dave

Fire

Ever since the debacle of the hostel in Washington where the fire engines and their sirens seemed to be our bed-companions we’ve been wary of where we stay but still we seem to end up in the vicinity of local fire stations. We only discovered this one after we had checked in at the motel and it is only 100 metres away. However, a notice on the station wall says they have been called out just 174 times this year, about once every 2 days so that’s okay. On the other hand we are here 2 days so maybe it’s a shade of odds on things will go clang in the night. Will let you know. Dave

Monday 17th November 2008

Rural Scenes
Today we drove south from Whitianga to Whakatane partly along the coast, but mostly inland. Much of the farming on the way was pastoral, as we’ve seen elsewhere so far, with cattle, both dairy and beef production everywhere, but more sheep in the north than here.
There is some arable, but with horticulture in evidence on the journey today, especially south of Katikati. This town was apparently very reliant on the production of kiwi fruit until the 1980s, when the price plummeted, and it has now become known as “Mural Town” as the exterior walls of many of the buildings in town have been painted to illustrate the business taking place in an effort to catch passing tourists.

Vineyards and avocados were plentiful and also other kinds of fruit: apple orchards, soft fruit like strawberries and blueberries. We bought some huge strawberries like this which we are looking forward to scoffing!


I had always thought blueberries grew on bushes rather like blackcurrants, but the “bushes” are more like small trees, and the ones we saw will apparently grow much larger.
We stopped in the hope of buying some blueberries to have with our cereal tomorrow, but were unlucky - they won’t be ripe for another couple of weeks.



Another fruit I knew nothing about was the persimmon. The leaf is a little like a large apple leaf, but the shape of the tree is wider. There was no fruit on these trees but I'm told one type of persimmon looks somewhat like a squashed tomato.
Jean