The Beginning Of The End

The moment I left my room at the Blenhium vineyard it marked the beginning of the end of my NZ trip. I left on the 5^th, which gave me 11 days to make it up to Auckland to get a flight to Hong Kong.

My first destination was Wellington. I had passed through it before, but not long enough to explore and get a feel for the city. It is the country’s capital after all. I had two options for transportation to the city. I could either get a plane flight, which costs NZ$ 84 or get a bus to the ferry and take that which costs NZ$ 66.  I went with the flight because the ferry situation takes 5 hours longer.

I took a 7 am flight into Wellington with Paul on that Monday morning. We walked up to the man behind the Air2There desk and said; “Hi, we are Paul and Ben.” He said, “Great! Put your bags there so I can weigh them .” We did that then took the bags off again and sat in the waiting area. No ticket, no security. No last names even. It was a new and welcomed change from the mess that Newark is.

We waited for a few minutes before walking out onto the tarmac to the plane. There were 8 other passengers on the plane that could fit 13. There was only one pilot, who happened to be the same person that checks you in. I put my own luggage beneath the plane, and then climbed into the co-pilot seat.( I had asked him earlier if I could sit in the cock-pit with him.) We took off out of Blenhium ON TIME then landed in Wellington 20 minutes later at 7:30.

That left me with ample time to explore Wellington.

The first thing I did was get some McDonalds and drop my backpack off at the hostel I was staying at.

Then I went to the library.

After the Library I spent about 2-3 hours exploring Te Papa. Te Papa is this HUGE free museum in Wellington. It’s like it’s a combination of the MET and Liberty Science Center. Except it’s not as big as the MET and not as exciting as the LSC.

After that I went on a tour of their parliament building. I almost fell asleep.

Got some dinner at a Thai place.

Then I went back to my hostel where I hung out with two German guys from my room. We were able to score ourselves some free lasagna and brownies from the downstairs kitchen.

The next day I got a bus to my first farm with Jenny and Perry. I had left a shirt there when I had left previously. I asked if I could return and stay with them from the 6^th to the 10^th. They were more than happy to oblige. What they didn’t tell me was that I would be working my freaking butt off.

 I arrived right in the middle of dagging time. Dagging is when we herd all the sheep in together and separate them from into lambs and ewe’s, which you’ll recall is moms and kids. We would weigh all the lambs and separate the ones that were guys and above 34 kg from the rest. Those were the lambs that were going to get sent to the slaughter house on the 11^th. We put a green mark on their head to signify that.

After that we had to dag all the sheep. The process of dagging is basically just shearing all the poppy wool away from the sheep’s butts so they don’t get infected by flies. For the big ewes there was a machine that would hold them but the lambs were too small. To dag the lambs I would grab them by their front legs and drag them to Perry who would cut off the wool. I was literally dripping sweat. I haven’t worked that hard in a long time.

 I stayed with them for a short time before saying goodbye for a final time. I got the bus to Manukau where I got picked up by a new wwoofing host where I’m staying till the 15^th. 

Cheers