A quick pictoral explanation of my trip south from Auckland, near the midpoint of the North Island, to a farm in Upper Moutere, near the North coast of the South Island:

The rather astonishing range of mountains we went through about three hours south of Auckland:

The bus driver pulled over for about ten minutes to let us have, as he put it, "a biff in the snow". I remained nonplussed.

(And here comes the requisite Mastercard commercial):Superwash merino fiber, from Fat Cat Knits on Etsy: $20

Spinning and plying to a fingering/sport weight: about 10 hours

Finishing knitting a pair of lovely, warm, squishy socks just in time for really cold feet on the bus ride: pretty darn good

Being That Kid who attempts to take pictures of her besocked and besandaled feet against the New Zealand backdrop on a very crowded double-decker bus: priceless.

The next morning, after a quick overnight in Wellington, I got up disgustingly early and hopped on the Interislander Ferry to Picton on the South Island. I was lucky enough to catch the sun breaking up the mist and the clouds over the sea:

After finally arriving in Upper Moutere, the view from my bedroom window:

(The little white things on the hill? Totally sheep. I am surrounded by sheep. I might be in heaven.)

And one of my favorite bits about this farm:

Baby goats!

This is Peony. She's trouble.

So, all in all, I am having a lovely time! I'll be out here in Upper Moutere until either Wednesday or Saturday, then I'm moving into Nelson proper for a while to work sorting and grading llama fiber for a felter. After that, who knows? It's all a big adventure!

And more baby goats, because I just can't help myself.

Southward Ho I Go!

My body is still, unfortunately, running on my leisurely home wake-up schedule, which means that a lovely 11 am wake-up at home is 4 am here. Oh well! It means I get to see the city wake up and play lots of games on my iPod, so we're all good.

I've had an absolutely wonderful time in the city--I am really not a city girl, but this is a good 'un. We lucked out on timing somewhat, since this weekend is the Diwali festival on the harbor here. Last night after dinner we walked down there and people-watched for a couple hours, cheering on the Bollywood dance competition and drooling over all the amazing food. Auckland has a much more diverse and much more populous Asian community, both East and South Asian, than I expected. All the little alleyways are crammed with some seriously amazing little shops and restaurants, and I am proud to say that I managed to secure myself a bubble tea on my first night in town! It's like I've got bubble tea radar!

I'm headed out in about an hour with a friend to catch a bus down to Wellington, where she'll stick around and where I'll hop on another ferry and two more buses tomorrow to get to my first farm in Upper Moutere, near Nelson on the South Island. I'm really looking forward to the drive: Auckland is the population center of the country, with over a million people in the metropolitan area. The entire country, on the other hand, only has *four* million people. So once I hit those city limits, I'm looking forward to farmland! And once I hit the South Island, it should be even better--they only have a million people total! Total isolation in a beautiful landscape, here I come.

Well, I'm off to make sure I've packed everything up and to see if I can't rustle up something interesting to eat for breakfast. See you on the South Island!

Well, after about twenty hours in the air, I am in New Zealand! I am currently hogging a corner of a couch at Auckland Backpacker's Hostel, a massive, 500-bed hostel in the center of the city. I'm torn between using my internet time responsibly, and eavesdropping on all the conversations and all the different languages going on.
I'll be laying pretty low here in Auckland--I'm not a very good big city tourist! I'll probably just find a coffee shop and camp out and look mysterious and aloof. Or, you know, trip over my own feet on the way in. Whichever.

Test!