We were back in Cromwell…again. And it wasn’t half bad this time. We got the cheapest gas and the free wifi at BNZ. Of course who can forget about the best naan in NZ. I even made Maggie eat some and she’s lactose intolerant. I had a traumatic experience at our campsite. I walked into the bathroom then I couldn’t get out. I kept pushing the door and turning the lock every which way. It was super dark and I didn’t even have a phone to have Maggie come rescue me. Luckily there was plenty of room above the door where I could climb over. As I started my climbing the door slowly started to swing inward as I was attached to it. Needless to say I am not a smart human.
I wake up around 730 every morning and just kind of sit around waiting for Maggie to get up, she needs her full 11 hours of sleep. But in preparation for cousin Anne’s visit she told me to start making breakfast at 9 to wake her up. Well I did that I opened door, banged around a lot of pans to make my egg, even turned on water after I finished to wash my dishes. And still Mags didn’t move a muscle. She is one champion sleeper.
We stayed at a really great campsite near Lake Pukaki, that Mags never got to see because of her sleeping habits. It's ok I took this picture so she wouldn't miss out.
We made it to our favorite place in NZ, possibly our favorite place ever, Duntroon. Duntroon is where Maddie and her amazing family live. It’s also where we get to be shepherds. Right now Maddie’s house is baby animal central. Her mum’s pug just had puppies and they are weeks old. They look like tiny baby bears. They also have 2 new hunt away puppies that Mr. Gibson will be training once they get older. At the moment Maddie’s w job is working on the dairy farm right up the road, where she gets to take care of baby cows, I’m talking day old baby cows.
We met Maddie at the cow farm where we got to help her teach the new baby cows how to drink. Yeah apparently they just not do that on their own. So we helped about 12 baby cows learn to drink. While they are babies these cows still weigh quite a lot and you just kind of have to push them along to find the feeding bottle. Then once you get all the babies eating it becomes a hot mess because they are babies and have the shortest attention span ever and start roaming off or worse going under the bottle bucket to knock off other baby cows. I’m not sure how Maddie does this on her own. There were three of us and we were all running about trying to feed cows and get others to stay in place. That night Mama Gibson made really super delicious BBQ. We were in shepherd heaven.
The next morning we needed to be up by 640 to help Mr. Gibson, probably our favorite Kiwi. Surprisingly Maggie didn’t epically fail at this task. She was actually much less of a sour puss then when I was told to get her up at 9 the other day. 7:00 – It’s shepherd time. Mr. Gibson acquired 2 new heading dogs, Lu and Ben. The dogs originally belonged to Gus, his son, but he just got an amazing job over in Canada, so now the dogs belong to Mr. Gibson. Mr. Gibson is a pro shepherd so Maggie essentially just do whatever he tells us to do whenever he tells us. Essentially we are no better than the dogs, I take that back the dogs are way better than we are. At one point Mr. Gibson yelled get on up (that’s his command for all the dogs to get back in the truck) and Maggie and I obeyed quite well.
Later in the day it was time to hay the mama and lamb paddock. We were originally told we wouldn’t be able to handle any lambs because they have a sent that their mum identifies and because they are technically still considered wild animals. However Mr. Gibson likes us or he feels sorry for us because we are a little hopeless at most things. But Mr. Gibson hopped out of the truck and ran so fast to chase the lamb and caught it. WE FINALLY GOT TO HOLD A BABY LAMB, AND I’M TALKING 27-HOUR-OLD BABY. I almost cried this was the whole reason for the NZ trip and it only took me 10 months to do it. After my moment was over we quickly put him back down to go find his mummy! I have deduced that much like human children lambs are cuter after a week or so. Don’t get me wrong this sheep was so cute I almost cried and way cuter than any human baby. But when you see them a little older they are a little fluffier and have a better-looking head.
Then rest of the day was spent herding sheep and drenching them (giving them worm vaccinations). At the end of the day we got a ride from an 18-wheeler back to the farm. This truck was huge, it was fantastic, almost better then when I got a ride from a plow in Boston! We said our goodbye but then Mr. Gibson made us a schedule for when Counsin Anne comes to town, so we will be seeing the Gibson’s again! Before we left their home Mr. Gibson brought us a bag full of meats, which we gratefully accepted…these people are really way too good to us! We met Maddie for dinner at none other than Fat Sally’s then we were off to Christchurch.
We seem to spend a lot of time in Christchurch for not liking the city that much. But alas we are here to wait to pick up cousin Anne! And of course every time we are in Christchurch it rains and rains and rains. We don’t have a good relationship with Christchurch. But this will be our last time here!
End Notes
It’s lamby baby season. So if hitchhikers are going to ride with us they will have to get past, or better join in on, the high pitched hysterics we go into every time we see baby lambs.
At the beginning of our trip we were very good about having cloths to sleep in and cloths to spend the day in. It has now morphed into wearing the same cloths until we smell a little bit too much.
My favorite sweatpants now have a hole in them. Molly will have to sew them when I get back. But it hasn’t stopped me from wearing them. Mainly because I have 3 pairs of pants and my leggings have had holes in them since the beginningish of our trip where I fell my way down Mt. Taranaki.
We realized we have a lot of flour left over. Maggie leaves in about a week and we all know I wont be using that flour. So Maggie has taken it upon herself to make pancakes at least once a day. And there have been so adventurous ones such as hot dog pancakes. Well food is food I guess.