Joe & Claire Come To New Zealand! I have been waiting for their arrival for a while now, and then… out of the blue Joe calls me! Hiiiiiiiii!!!!!!!! I said, “so when are you coming to meet up with us?” This weekend he says! So I dashed down the farm to let Mikko know straight away as I was full of excitement! J We bought food and sorted the preparations in time for their arrival! We met up with on Sunday night, after their epic Fishing trip weekend. It was an extremely strange moment to see people I know… especially when it’s family! I was in a daze for a short while. Anyway…the first point of call? Had to be the bottle shop of course! We got some essentials and headed back to our lovely new home for a BIG catch up!! : )
The next day… we were all feeling a little hung-over. But, it was Monday morning so we all decided to help out on the farm. The first mission was to get the sheep from the field to the yard. NOT as easy as it sounds, especially when ONE decides to go the wrong way, 1500 sheep follow!
20 minutes later and mission accomplished!
Next mission? The Quad Bike! We had a little demonstration, and It was going well… until Joe’s turn, he jumped straight on full of bean’s spun off down the field, came hurtling back a little too fast and lost control! Hilarious! The quad went one way and he went the other, he leaped in the air and landed about 10 feet away!! What an adrenalin rush!
Now Claire on the other hand…she was the sensible one of us all, she climbed on to the quad all ladylike… then drove 2kmph! and the rest of us? well… we practiced doing doughnuts and driving at the speed of light!
After the excitement of the Quad, and laughing hysterically at Joe it was now 9am and time to do some work! So, we went back to the yard and made ourselves useful. 1500 sheep needed drenching, which basically means all the sheep are lined up 15-20 at a time, two people place Ghostbusters style backpacks on, which are connected to a tube that squirts some lovely, not so delicious worming treatment into their mouths. Sound simple? yea right! Not when the sheep is frantically trying to get away from you. The best method is to get your legs around the sheep and hold on tight! Which isn’t easy, your tired after the third one, but when hungover? Your tired after one! Meanwhile… three people are the painters! Yup! They get to spray the heads of the sheep fluorescent orange! Good times!
By lunch time we were feeling run down, so…hair of the dog right? Lunch time larger and sarnie! Ah, much better, and we were finished by 2pm! Time to head to Kev’s!...
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Wooohooo… so once again, we get our the Retro Land Rover from 1901 and the dirt bike! This time with two extra people on board. So we head off down the beach in the 4x4, when I find a snorkel and goggles ooh great I thought, half way to Mahooters hill, Kev takes a detour around the dunes, that’s when the camera came out and before I knew it, I was launched from my seat, my head smashed into the windscreen and we were in a ditch! Everyone rushed to my rescue, but it was ok, luckily I have a very hard head! The windscreen wasn’t so lucky, and was completely destroyed. I was more concerned for Kev’s Land Rover than my head, I apologised several times which he thought was hysterical, he was just glad my head was ok!
So whilst I recovered with a bottle of beer, the boys got on with rescuing the beloved Land Rover out from the ditch, which surprisingly didn’t take too long and we were soon back on track, and making good use of the dirt bike. So, Logan was first as per usual. Then Joe got the adrenaline bug and was next up, he drove up and down the beach before heading towards the dunes…a big run up! And vroooooooooom, he was going, going, going and noooo he lost it, wasn’t going fast enough and the bike fell backwards and he didn’t make it. Extremely good effort though!! !Next up? Mikko. Here’s a pro in action….heads off down the beach and back, shoots straight up Mahooters hill and before you know it, he’s gone, out of sight at the top of the dunes. Then Kev makesit look easy peasy, he doesn’t even need a run up, he just takes off from the bottom of the hill and makes it to the top in no time at all! The boys can’t have all the fun, so after a couple of previous sessions on the back of the bike I wanted to be the driver and I was ready and rearing to go! One slight hitch, I am too short to even touch the floor when sitting on the bike, so Mikko sat on behind me. It was very useful as he could also explain to me how I actually move it. You would not believe how much there is to know! Crickey!! It’s more difficult than learning to drive a car. So after I stalled it, Mikko rev’d up the engine and explained what I needed to do. Whoa, what a good feeling, especially when you drive it on the beach! I didn’t think it was too wise to attempt the Hill, I’ll leave that top the boys for now…and Claire? Na, the Quad was challenging enough for her this morning. I did, however want to get up the hill.. “its like a desert” they keep telling me. The only other way up is to use your legs. So beer in hand, and pockets, me and Claire went on a little mission to climb up this monstrosity! The shoes were off, and we climbed and climbed, supping lager (doesn’t really help) and taking photos. Claire gave in, and admired the view, whilst I soldiered on. Oooh, I was past half way when my legs were turning to jelly, the guys were flying up and down the hill whilst I was still on the way up! But I made it! Yes just as Mikko got there on the bike. It was in fact like a desert, the sun was setting and I had my last chance of the day to get on the bike again before the sun set. I climbed up on the back, and held on for dear life, the hills and slopes were humungous! We were travelling at the speed of light (well almost) and flying up and down these amazing hills on top of Mahooters Hill, such an adrenaline rush!
By now, it was dark, so we met the others down on the beach and made a lovely camp fire to keep warm before heading back home for a tasty Chinese takeaway.
The next morning we all work about 6.am and said our last goodbyes before Joe and Claire left for the airport back to England L
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