Hot and Dry on GBI Greetings from my “possie”, as one of the guys who came in to mop up our rats and mice is fond of calling our little place. Bill’s a most colourful speaker and those rodents are nothing more than the remaining wee this-and-that projects to finish the house. The Woman in the Dunes For a time many years ago this 1962 novel by Japanese writer Kobo Abe was a favourite of mine. It’s about a schoolteacher who visits a fishing village to collect insects. After missing the last bus home, the villagers lead him to a house in the dunes that can be reached only by rope ladder. The next morning the ladder is gone. He’s captive with no chance of escape, tasked with helping the young woman who lives there shovel back the ever-advancing sand that threatens to destroy the house and the village. His fate becomes intertwined with hers as they work together to keep back the sand. Eventually he realises that returning to his old life would give him no more liberty and he gives up trying to escape. Luckily our situation on Sparkle Knoll wasn’t extreme or existential. Living on a dune was kind of fun, walking around barefoot in the sand whenever we went outside, but we soon learned that windblown sand finds its way relentlessly into whatever’s in its path, including open windows. Four loads of topsoil were trucked in, and then it was Charlie to the rescue! Over several afternoons on his tractor he spread it all out, and Ro and Jordan grabbed a shovel and a rake and smoothed it over. It’s starting to green up around the house as the ubiquitous kikuyu inexorably creeps in and covers the ground. Our rental house used to shake, rattle and roll in high wind and we were certain that this one wouldn’t. But, lo and behold – despite its high wind zone design (the whole island is considered a high wind zone) with a “specifically engineered foundation” including sentons 1.5 m into the ground once they reach original ground, and a dense multitude of bracing walls, bracing gib, roof frame strapping, bracing bolts to the bearers, extra studs and nogs over, under and all around – it does! Sometimes I find my chair and table and the computer and display, and me!, all shaking as the wind whistles and screams. Gifts of rain and purple skies Yes, we live in a context of weather! A few weeks ago, after another long dry spell, the island wasn’t treated to the predicted and hoped-for day-long tank-filling rain, but periods of steady downfalls totalled 78 mm in the trusty old rain gauge we’ve used for decades (and verified against a neighbour’s proper gauge in Golden Bay), and after a bit of tank-banging we estimated 2/5 full, or about 10,000 gallons. FANtastic! That evening, 90 km over the Hauraki Gulf in Auckland, people were awed by a purple sky. A meteorologist guessed the effect was caused by sunlight scattering off clouds or fine droplets of rain. “I haven’t heard of anything like it before,” he said. An esteemed guest After too many years, we were at last reunited with our dear friend Ashna, of truckbox fame, the man with the skills and the heart who starred in the story of our stuff, making it possible for us to reconnect with our belongings from Golden Bay. He’d never been to the Barrier and he couldn’t have two more enthusiastic guides! It’s the hottest January week in history for the entire country and he’s enjoyed a different swim spot every day. Some days, two swims, including a morning dip in the Mermaid Pool. We found him the choicest camping spot on the island, a secluded site at Sugarloaf campground, just above the south end of Kaitoke Beach and around the rocks from the pool. He borrowed two tents: a mosquito net tent for warm nights that I made probably in the 1970s, and a tramping tent for cooler nights that we used on tracks, canoe trips and bicycle travel in decades past. Views from Ashna’s campsite. The rest of the campground is across the stream. The Mermaid Pool is around the corner to the right. Yesterday we took him on an eastern tour, to Blind Bay and Okupu Wharf. It’s a great joy to be together, and to enjoy Ashna enjoying the island while he enjoys us enjoying him enjoying the island! Remote Okupu Wharf from a distance and close up. Coromandel Peninsula and Channel Rock in the background. Butterflies and Swans The churchyard garden at Medlands is replete with swan plants, New Zealand’s most common milkweed and one of the monarch butterfly’s host plants. So this special garden is also replete with monarchs, which lay their eggs on the plants, whose balloon-like cases are full of seeds for their next generation. Nature at its brilliant best amazes and delights. Swan plant leaves contain a toxic sap. After the eggs hatch into caterpillars, they start feeding at the base of the leaves and the sap drains away. But the adults can tolerate the toxicity, which actually helps them survive – they taste so bad that birds leave them alone. The caterpillar keeps eating for two weeks. When fully grown it’s ready for the metamorphical miracle. It attaches to a stem or a leaf and transforms into a hard cocoon, the chrysalis. Ten days later – emergence. A few hours more and the monarch flies off to feed on flowers. Within a month, it will lay the next generation of eggs, and mission accomplished, it dies. Did you know that unlike most other insects in New Zealand, which arrived on strong westerly winds from Australia, it’s believed the monarch island-hopped across the Pacific from North America? The swan plant is native to southeast Africa. A seemingly random yet perfect match. New Year’s Picnic The Day-After-New-Year’s-Day Picnic – the most attended event of the year – has been raising money for local charities for over 70 years. This year we had a stall to recirculate items that proved surplus to requirements in our wee possie. It was a fun day of talking to people, enjoying the ambience and the entertainment, and then heading happily away for our swim with a lot less stuff and a few hundred dollars more. Aotea Poison Free – Stop the Drop Alas, it’s all too familiar. This time DOC has its sights on Rakitu Island, a 329-hectare nature reserve 2.5 km off the Barrier’s northeast coast at Whangapoua Beach, near Okiwi. The target is rats, and the toxin isn’t 1080 but even worse, brodifacoum. The usual scenario – drop announced, dismay expressed in the community, legitimate concerns voiced about deadly poison dropping off the sheer 180-metre cliffs into the sea and working its way up the food chain, “Stop the Drop” group forms, information on safe and effective up-to-the-minute trapping alternatives shared, letters in the local rag, masses of petition signatures gathered and delivered to the head dude. Aotea Poison Free at the New Year's Picnic “Stop the Drop” Jordan joins the group delivering the petition The situation is still playing out, but when DOC announces its final decision, the next stage is people chaining themselves to fences. Golden Bay-ites may remember young Quaid, whose direct action of destroying a load of soon-to-be-dropped 1080 forced him to leave the country, never to return. Does anyone really think the drop can be stopped? I hope my cynicism will be proven wrong. True Tales We always wondered about the rocks at Blind Bay. Sometimes in deeper water you can see boulders of different sizes on the sea floor. Now, after reading the first of the three True Tales of Great Barrier Island books published by the GBI History Research Group, we know how they got there. Here’s the tale behind the rocks. If you don’t have time for or interest in the whole story, just read the last sentence, “Editor’s note”. Historic Schooner by Colin Amodeo The 81.5 foot, three-masted schooner Rifleman had been built at Manning River, New South Wales, by shipwright Alexander Newton in 1862. Purchased by Canterbury merchants J. C. Aikman and Captain Thomas McClatchie later that year, the schooner traded to Wanganui and Taranaki in the timber, cattle and grain trade. She also carried commissariat stores, particularly to Waitara and Tauranga, for British Army regiments in the Land Wars of the 1860s. By 1868, she was on the Lyttelton-Chatham Islands run, bringing home wool cargoes and taking out supplies for the Hau Hau prisoners exiled there at the settlement of Waitangi. In early July that year, Te Kooti seized the Rifleman and forced her crew to sail for New Zealand with 298 Maori warriors and their families. The schooner was virtually undamaged and the crew were finally released unharmed to go about their business. The subsequent massacre of Maori and European settlers by Te Kooti’s men in November 1868 is well known and the Rifleman’s seamen, on her return to Lyttelton via Wellington, must have had some hair-raising stories to tell. However, McClatchie was furious since his cargo had been dumped overboard and the profits from the voyage lost. Under Captain Joseph Hobbs, the Rifleman continued to trade to the Chathams. McClatchie’s trading partner, Thomas Ritchie, was developing a large estate at Kaingaroa on the eastern side of the island, sending wool to Lyttelton for shipment to London, and receiving grain and supplies in return. Hobbs was returning Ritchie from Auckland to Kaingaroa in August 1871. While in the Colville Channel, the Rifleman was caught in a boisterous southwest gale which forced her towards Great Barrier Island. Ritchie wrote in his diary that the schooner had her lee bulwarks under water most of the time as Hobbs fought to keep her off the land. Mistaking Blind Bay for Tryphena Harbour, he was fortunate to strand the Rifleman on sand, not rock, as ‘one mass of breakers’ carried her some 200 metres up the beach with her crew clinging to the rigging. She rolled broadside on, badly holed in the bilge. Hobbs had to leave her and make his way to Auckland for assistance. Marine Assessor Captain M. T. Clayton arrived with shipwrights from Henderson & Spraggon and the Rifleman was patched sufficiently to sail for the Waitemata. On isolated Great Barrier Island, it must have been quite a task to shift the 83-foot long vessel. One assumes she was hauled onto rollers and kedged off into deep water. As expected, there was a Marine Inquiry. The Court found that the mishap had been caused by Hobbs’ ‘miscalculation of the vessel’s position when laid to’. Given the conditions in the Hauraki Gulf, this was hardly surprising. However, the Rifleman’s owner, Captain McClatchie, was not impressed. When Hobbs eventually returned to Lyttelton with the repaired schooner and a large bill, he lost his command. Postscript: Captain Peter Toomey took the Rifleman to sea on 10 November 1871, destined for Havelock in Pelorus Sound and a timber cargo. She was never seen again. Perhaps she capsized in Cook Strait in a heavy gale. The Rifleman was not only one of Canterbury’s historic vessels but, being three-masted, she was unusual on the New Zealand coast at that time. Owners and masters preferred two-masted schooners and ketches since these required fewer seaman and sail changes. The Rifleman’s large sail area may well have contributed to her capsize, especially if she had been under-ballasted. Editor’s note: The ballast stones taken out of the damaged vessel at Blind Bay to lighten her are still there under the sand, and are occasionally uncovered. For more samplings of local history, you can download the first two True Tales of Great Barrier Island books at these links: https://www.dropbox.com/s/4ntv7juezndzahq/True%20Tales%20of%20Great%20Barrier%20island%20-%20with%20Dave%202%20-%20Copy.pdf?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/eriboanzp132uwh/001%20More%20True%20Tales%20of%20Great%20Barrier%20Island%2019th%20May%202014%20B.pdf?dl=0 Learning to be comfortable out of my comfort zone http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11981235 About 30 metre-long hammerhead sharks in shallow water at Gooseberry Flat beach feature in this drone video from a few days ago. They're juveniles, says shark scientist Clinton Duffy, and pose no risk to swimmers. I never knew, and never knew how happy I was not to know, that the Hauraki Gulf and the Firth of Thames are one of the largest hammerhead nursery grounds in New Zealand. Pah Beach, where we often swim when we’re in Tryphena, is just around a rocky headland from Gooseberry Flat. We were there today, on Ashna’s southern tour. He was easy with juvenile hammerheads, and I was too – especially because we didn’t see any! Can you guess? Big hint below*** Maybe you can guess what these are too. Evening rainbow *** Clouds, water or sand? Now you know! The flowers were pea flowers from Gerald and Caity. Medlands and mountains Uni-verse
The silver sea stretches before our eyes Endless swells sweep to shore Magical mountains move with the sun An artful environment for harmonious living. As time tugs us slowly through sequential moments Ripening our fruitful bowl of golden maturity With love and wonder we observe and absorb The sparkling summit's knowledge, the dancing water’s wisdom.
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