Happy Birthday Ma’am

As we are almost certainly living on one of the furthest-flung corners of Her Majesty’s vast dominions, we decided to celebrate her birthday with a formal dinner. Coincidentally it was also Gina’s 27th birthday on the same day so we went for the double whammy. Imaginations ran wild with the royal theme, as you can see from the photos. This probably reflects NZ’s increasingly cosmopolitan heritage, although I was a little offended that my attempt at formal attire resulted in persistent enquiries about any good real estate deals or used cars I might be able to put people onto.

In another example of the six degrees of separation that connects us all, we realised this week that Gina is actually Franz’s daughter. Franz was a good friend and outdoor companion of Neil S. and Shona; I met him on a number of occasions in the mountains and out kayaking. I remember him for his determination to make his seakayak and his river boat himself. Tragically he died in an accident in Alaska some years ago.

Roast lamb was on the menu last night, followed by fruit salad and a chocolate cake the size of a cannonball. There were a few rousing toasts to the health of the queen (and Gina) and a good time was had by all.

The left-foot jandal conundrum

We get a lot of jetsam washing up on our beaches here. There are a heck of a lot of fishing buoys, too many plastic bottles and a surprising number of left-foot jandals.

Why left-foot jandals? It’s hard to provide a definitive answer to that question, but one has been suggested after a lot of careful thought and analysis. It goes like this:

At any one time, the Pacific Ocean has a lot of people making that critical step out of the water and into a dinghy. Most will be goofy footers (ie they lead off with the right foot. Take a look at a snowboard hire shop near you and you’ll see by the binding configuration that “naturals” or left foot leaders, are in a minority)

A good proportion of these dinghy boarders will have had a drink or two but they have enough nous to clamp their right toes down onto the jandal as they make their first critical move. However, once committed they realise that their weight must continue the boarding process or they are going to get mighty wet. So they lunge forward, forgetting to lock down the toes on their left foot as it drags out of the water behind them.

Off comes the jandal, it floats out over the water to end up sometime later on our beach.

The Navy delivers

Gaye is back with us, courtesy of the HMNZS Canterbury.

They gave her the royal treatment: cabin, silver service, exercise in Hagley Park (as it is a large ship, various parts are labelled after Christchurch landmarks. She says she didn’t visit Manchester St).

The ship appeared right out in front of our home on Tuesday morning.

We all stood out under the flagpole in the rain, gawking at it. It looked absolutely massive after all the piffling little boats that have visited lately. Then the Sea Sprite was fired up and they whisked her ashore. She arrived cuddling a little black petrel, which had parked up on the deck in the stormy weather overnight. Worried that it might end up in the rotors, a crewmember snatched it up and handed it to her as she boarded the helicopter. Everyone was thrilled to have her back, especially me. However, there have been a few niggly little problems that underline the need to re-integrate a returning member of a community very carefully.

First, she committed the cardinal sin of sitting in John’s seat at the dinner table. No-one said anything until midway through the main course. Then, this morning, she made her cup of tea in Gareth’s cup! Gareth is not a morning person, and Craig and I have had a running challenge to see who could be the first to get him to return our “Good morning” greetings. So far neither of us has achieved more than a silent wave.

We have realised the need to warn her she is inadvertently committing a social transgression. I have devised a secret signal to let her know in case she gives Chauncy the big fork with bent tynes, sits in John’s outside chair, upsets Craig by neglecting to do her morning dishes, puts meat in the vegetarian fridge or swears at the Pukekos.

Such are the perils of island life.

Idling on a Sunday

Last Sunday was a little cooler than usual, so three of us set out to visit the local hotsprings, which are 300m down the beach in front of the hostel. The water is about 75 degrees and bubbles up out of the beach at the low tide waterline. You need to grab a strategically placed barrel and use a bucket to fill it with the appropriate mixture of sea and hot water.

Then you climb inside and soak. By afternoon the surf was looking inviting so the kayak came out of its hiding place under the bush at the end of the track. Surfing at Raoul can be a little daunting when you focus too much on the sharks or the fact that there is nothing but sea for 1000km in every direction. This is not a good place to miss your roll. For that reason we have a protocol that there is always a watcher or swimmer at hand when you go into the water. On the other hand, if you want a particular wave – hey, it’s yours! If not, there’s always another one.

That's good enough for me!

David Meagher (aka The Moss Man)

David has actually just left us with the departure of the MV Braveheart on Thursday 21 May.

He is in the process of embarking on his third career, as a botanist, having previously worked in the field of physics and as an editor and publisher in science and education. He was anxious to return to the winter in Melbourne and place under the microscope the 447 samples of bryophyte (plants that reproduce using spores) that he has collected in his time here, some of them new to the world of science. His particular interest is in the similarities of plants on Lord Howe, Norfolk and Raoul islands.

A somewhat enigmatic character, he made a determined (but ultimately unsuccessful) effort to get us to declare Raoul a republic, usually beginning his efforts shortly after the first drinks had been consumed in the evening. I think his Plan B was to quietly go ahead and change the colour of the stars on our NZ flag, adding a new one in the process. He has told us he is doing his doctorate studies courtesy of a government scholarship but word on the ground here has it that he is secretly employed by the Australian intelligence services to extend Australia’s borders at all costs.

An example of the subtle way he tried to usurp our kiwi way of life and make us into aussies

David was particularly impressed by the pristine Nikau forests we have here on the island. He remembers his visit to the grave of Fleetwood Denham (more on this later), having read about it in The Voyage of the Herald many years before his visit here. The crater also made an impression on him, since he fell into it. He managed to remove some of his skin in the process. In fact, it is fair to say that during his stay he garnered for himself something of a reputation for being accident prone. He suffered cuts, the odd fall and managed to dislocate the same finger twice in one day!

While Andrew's injuries were being attended to, David kept us entertained with his tale of being hit by a car while riding his motorbike. Luckily, he says, there were some off duty doctors and nurses close at hand because they were able to verify that it was an opportunistic little dog that ran off with the missing piece of his leg.

Fact File:

Favourite book: Prester John by John Buchan

Favourite film: North by Northwest dir. Alfred Hitchcock

Favourite CD: Songs of the Auvergne Kiri te Kanawa

Favourite joke: A rugby team is being slaughtered by the opposition. They come in at half time, 40 points down, limping, with broken noses and bruises a-plenty. The coach, searching for a way to fire up his team, spots the diminuitive winger in the corner, muttering what sounds like “Be positive! Be positive! Be positive!”

“You see,” cries the coach, pointing at the player, “this is the spirit we need to turn this game around!”

Startled, the player looks up and responds “It’s not my attitude I need to remember – it’s my blood group!”

The Finger of Death

“Pink tape!”

This is the shout we listen out for when we are in the field doing what we came here to do. It signifies the discovery of an “inf,” or infestation, of any of the plants on the wanted list. High on that list are Black Passionfruit, Brazilian Buttercup and …Peach! I guess that just emphasises how the definition of a weed can include any plant not in its natural environment.

We grid-search plots looking for the location of previous weed discoveries; they are marked by the tying of the aforementioned pink tape to a tree or branch. We then search for evidence of new seedlings and rip out any that we find. GPS is used for navigation, but also the outside of a search path can be delineated by string that unwinds from a spool inside a container fixed to someone’s waist. That way nothing is missed.

Craig on the weeding track - he's in there somewhere!

It might sound like a fairly genteel way to pass the time, but it’s not. The ground is steep – vertical in places – and clogged with bracken, ferns, nikau and windfall pohutukawas.

Pohutukawa snaking off downhill

These latter are amazing in that they can grow huge, blow over in a storm, re-root themselves from branches and then repeat the whole cycle many times over. We have discovered some that loop off downhill like petrified giant serpents, for 30 or 40 metres. If they are on your intended track, sometimes the only way to get past them is to wriggle underneath the lowest branch on your belly. You can climb over them, but it’s not uncommon to find yourself 7 metres off the ground with no more handholds to keep you from falling. Slips are common and happen after rain or sometimes earthquakes

A weeding team re-gathers for compulsory DOC morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea out on the track somewhere and typically then we will then solve the problems of the world. So far we have sorted out religion and politics without long term fallout, although our leader Chauncy tells us that in the past people have had major disagreements that have tainted everyone’s experience of the island. They can no longer speak to one another, won’t sit at the same table to eat and bail out with a tent at every opportunity in order to get away from the offending party.

Break time! Sometimes you just have to climb a tree.

Anyway, here are some of my GPS stats from yesterday’s effort on LF06, which includes the dreaded “Finger of Death,” a long and very steep ridge which drops straight down into the valley.

Speed 900m per hour
Odometer 7.76km
Total ascent 648m
Max height 299m

Post Script: This entry was written after our foray into LF06 on Friday. Another team went back to finish off the plot on Monday and found that the whole hillside where I took some of these photos had let go and is now piled 10m deep on the valley floor....

Two birds and two beaches

Petrel chick on the track to the volcano - a football-size ball of fluff!

Kakariki - they're everywhere!

Denham Bay beachThe north side of the island, where we live