Downtown Pukekohe

Nice olde worlde shop in main street of Pukekohe. This lovely old sign is a classic.

Cafe Berne, Pukekohe

Another addition to the Food Hero list. MDR & MB dropped in here yesterday (& today) for a coffee and were very pleasantly surprised when they were told on ordering a double shot coffee that all their coffee was made double shot! Pleased to report the coffee was good and strong and also really hot. Tops marks to Cafe Berne.

Kawakawa Bay, North Island, NZ

This lovely vista is Kawakawa Bay, the first ocean sighting for MB & MDR since they arrived.
After some web surfing MB found an oyster farm outside the pretty village of Clevedon, about 40 minutes from Pukekohe, so the pair headed over there today. Pity MB didn't call first as the oyster farm was closed until Tue 6 Jan 09. Foolishly MB relied on the oyster farm's advertised opening hours on their website.
Not to be deterred the pair did some touring around the coastline and stopped at Orewa Point for a mini picnic (minus the oysters which were going to be starring attraction). The sea around these parts is a beautiful turquoise blue and according to MDR quite warm.
On the way back the duo spotted the Italian Country Market (between Clevedon & Papakura). This deli was a real find with some seriously good produce. It's run by Bart from New York who comes from a long line of Italian stone masons, but it wasn't a calling he aspired to. This shop is a real food lovers' haven with the duo stocking up on some local Olive oil plus the most delicious, huge South Island cherries.
Driving to Clevedon wasn't without incident, MB & MDR are sans Le Tomtom relying on foldout maps and road signs to get around. The pair got lost in Papakura both times, however the signage to Clevedon, after Papakura, was fantastic. MB is wishing they'd gone to the trouble of buying and downloading an NZ map and bought the tomtom with them, maybe one can be hired? Otherwise the "cordial relations" are going to be stretched to the limit....

Wright's Water Gardens

Sunday dawned clear and sunny, a good omen for Philip's camping trip. After an early morning spearsfishing lesson on the driveway with MDR, the guys packed the trailer, with MDR showing off his very nautical knot tying skills. The Pukekohe crew finally got away at 9:30am, not too far behind schedule at all. MDR & MB are now home alone and for their first outing decided to visit the nearby Wright's Water Garden, which is only about 15 mins from Pukekohe.
This is a beautiful garden established in an abandoned quarry next to the Wauku Waterfall and features spectacular water lilies and lotus flowers. Being summer the lilies are all in glorious flower, creating a wonderful multi coloured display, well worth a visit.

Saturday Night in Pukekohe

Philip's parents cooked up a storm on Saturday night.  Mike diligently sought out the best fresh produce that morning and that night with Jacquie produced a gorgeous dinner.  Jacquie's vinaigrette was particularly good and the dessert was superb, strawberries are grown locally and are at their best right now.
Dinner was at Philip's sister's house and after a few glasses of NZ pinot noir, the grown ups all loosened up and got into some lively discussions, expecially with regard to the planning for the upcoming camping trip.
Maddie, Monica's youngest produced an itinerary for the first day of the camping trip which got everyone chuckling.

Maddie's Itinerary

A little travel agent in the making!

Pukekohe, New Zealand

MDR & MB landed in Auckland at 00:30am on the second day of the year after a comfortable flight on PacificBlue (VirginBlue NZ carrier). Philip & Emma met the pair at the airport which is about 20 minutes drive from their home in Pukekohe - exceptionally nice of them to do an airport run at such a late hour.
First thing next morning, Philip was in boot camp mode and had us walking up the hill, in the rain, to his swank new home, the "Citadel", where he and Emma will live while they build their dream home on a nearby acreage.
Philip & Emma showed the duo around Pukekohe, however MB is totally confused as each time they go somewhere, it's via different route. The team also went to nearby Tuakau, birthplace of Sir Edmund Hillary, after a hearty lunch at the Autobahn when finding that just about everything is closed on 2nd Jan due to it being a public holiday. Tuakau is known locally as solo mum town and there is no signage or monument commemorating the town as the birthplace of Hillary. This struck MB has pretty remiss as it would be quite a tourist drawcard.
First night into the trip and MDR & MB cooked a coq-au-vin for dinner with a free range chicken which was very tasty.
After dinner another walk was had by the team, this time in the reserve behind Philip's place which has recently been re-vegetated with NZ natives and looks spectacular.
Wine is pretty cheap, bought a Pinot Noir from France for the princely sum of $7.99. Fresh beans on the other hand were $17.90 per kg (at the local supermarket). Pukekohe by the way is located in the market garden hub of NZ.
Luckily MB found out about the local farmers' market on Saturday morning which was great for fresh greens, beans were only $2.50 and beautifullly fresh.
Breakfast today for MDR & MB at the Farmers' Market was some delicious fried pork dumplings from the Fongs. When Philip turned up a bit later turns out he knew the Fongs and was given a big serve of Fried Rice on the house. Everywhere Philip goes, he knows someone and always has time for a chinwag.
Philip & Emma head off to the Coromandel for a camping trip with the extended family tomorrow and preparations have been pretty feverish. MDR helped Philip find a speargun today at a spearfishing shop in Auckland. MB whispered to Philip on their way into the shop that MDR wouldn't leave without buying something. Sure enough just as the team were about to leave, after having quite a chat with the owner, MDR spotted some good dive belts and bought one. MDR couldn't understand what the rest of the team found so amusing about him buying something....

Flickr

MB is puzzled by the popularity on her Flickr site of a rather obscure photo of a pavement tile she spotted in Tokyo illustrated with a Panda Bear.  This photo was uploaded in May 2005 and is now the most viewed photo her Flickr site, just trumping her photo of Norm's Coolie Dogs taken in Tanunda, South Australia.
MB finds that collecting photos of things she loves, ie Panda Bears, is much easier than cluttering up her life with panda toys and other panda ephemera. 
One would be hard pressed to predict the popularity of these photos.

That1Guy

Mike Silverman, aka That1Guy, was in town last week and did a show at the Tanks last Friday night.  MDR spotted a newspaper article about the show and remembered seeing this guy on Spicks & Specks.
Mike is a one man band, a classically trained bassist who has developed a home made pipe and string instrument/synthesiser, shaped a bit like a harp, he calls it his magic pipe.
The Tanks is as the name suggests, an old water storage tank, converted to a very funky venue, only downside is there is no air conditioning, so That1Guy performed in what must have been 30c and 95% humidity.  He put on an amazing, energetic and intriguing show, his music covers the whole spectrum from classical to techno, using his magic pipe as well as a cowboy boot, and a carpenters saw (both of these were plugged into the amplifier by the way). 
A really good show, amazing music and the lyrics of some of the stuff he has written are crazy, reminiscent of Frank Zappa.

DVD Rulz

Flicking through today's Weekend Australian Magazine MB was struck by the many advertisements for DVDs, 9 large adverts in total, compared to 4 adverts for books. She then read in the The Australian Review that Aussies are bigger consumers of DVDs than Americans & Brits (Michael Bodey "DVD Letterbox"). MB thinks she knows at least one of the major reasons why this is so, both free to air and pay TV push so many damn ads on us the viewing public that we now prefer to watch our favourite series on DVD.
I noticed on free to air TV in the UK that ads were infrequent and limited to 2 or perhaps 3 ads per ad break, I found out the reason for this some time later when I was looking at the BBC website, TV licensing. Every TV in the UK must be licensed with the annual cost per TV being £139.50 per annum. This funds the great tv programming being produced in the UK.
There is also some wonderful TV being produced in Australia, albeit on a much smaller scale, mostly by the ABC. I notice Channel Nine's latest local offering is "The Waiting Room" a reality series made in a hospital waiting room. The think tank must've been working overtime to dream that one up. To give them credit though they did produce Underbelly which was sensational, all the better too as a lot of unknown talent starred, giving the series a really fresh appeal. Due to the aforementioned advertising down your throat issue, the MB family only watched Underbelly on DVD and is looking forward to the next series - on DVD of course!
Even good ol' SBS is running advertising during programs which is such a dreadful shame. It won't be long before someone puts a subscription only ad-free channel on air, MB for one would happily pay a couple of bucks a week for the privilege of not having to endure inane advertising during her TV viewing.

£1,000,000 Prize for 100% Chemical Free Material

Some very frustrated boffins at the Royal Society of Chemistry have become incensed that the word "chemical" now more or less means "poisonous", and have offered one million pounds to "the first member of the public who can place in the hands of the director of the RSC any material considered 100% chemical free".

Red Pen Detrimental to Mental Health

Queensland teachers are being advised not to use red pen to mark students' work as it may affect their mental health.
Apparently red "can be seen as aggressive". See the full article at http://tinyurl.com/5byzpb
Might be time to get into Bubblewrap Futures it will no doubt become a growth industry!

Asper Park Open Garden, 30 November 2008

One couldn't find nicer and more convivial hosts than Viv & Susan Stephens, pioneers of bamboo shoot farming on the Atherton Tablelands who opened up their property to the public yesterday under the banner of the excellent Australian Open Garden scheme.
Asper Park is little gem of an acreage just outside of Atherton on the Ravenshoe road which the Stephens have converted from bare farming land to an oasis of European style gardens with an adjoining bamboo grove.
The farm is named for the variety of Indonesian Bamboo the Stephens are growing for it's shoots, Dendrocalamus Asper, a large clumping variety that grows to 30m tall.
A group of about 20 visitors from all sorts of backgrounds, farmers, retirees and urban types with dreams of farmlets, turned up at 9:30am on an overcast and humid Sunday morning for a 2 hour tour of the property and learnt just about everything there is to know about cultivating and harvesting bamboo shoots.
The Stephens are passionate about bamboo and were unstintingly generous in sharing their extensive knowledge and experience of bamboo farming since 2000 when they first planted their bamboo culms.
Not only is the bamboo grove an incoming producing farm, it is incredibly peaceful with a stillness and serenity that feels other worldly, it would be a wonderful place for contemplation and meditation.
Viv & Susan's gamble to grow a food crop that is barely known in Australia has been spectacularly successful with all of their bamboo shoots pre-sold to mostly Asian restaurants in Sydney. Viv explained the myriad other uses for bamboo which have not taken off in Australia; pulping of bamboo cane for fibre which can be used for flooring, fabric and paper, activated charcoal products - bamboo produces very high quality carbon and the obvious other bamboo appications fencing, screening and furniture making. Amazingly enough this is only scratching the surface as the uses for bamboo in Asia are even more surprising; bamboo is trained and grown into specific shapes to make musical instruments, such as saxophones and horns, as well as the better known flutes. MB saw for sale in China bamboo sleeping mats which were made of very small bamboo "tiles" woven together. Didn't look very comfortable but millions of Chinese can't be wrong!
MDR has been looking for some bamboo poles for some time to build a fence and Viv was kind enough to offer him some bamboo poles when the next thinning is done in about a month's time.
MDR & MB did also get to taste fresh bamboo shoot, and some of Susan's pickled bamboo shoot, which is very popular with corned beef at Olivera's deli in Innisfail. The fresh shoot was very refreshing and juicy with a slight nutty flavour, would be absolutely delicious in a stir-fry dish. Alas the shoots are only just coming into season, perhaps later in the month MB can get her hands on some fresh shoots to experiment with at home.

Leapin' Leeches

A hot summer's day on the Atherton Tablelands wouldn't be complete without a waterfall visit.
After visiting Asper Park MDR & MB went for a dip at Elinjaa Falls near Millaa Millaa which has a beautiful deep rockpool at it's base, just the ticket for a hot and humid day.
MB was trying to photograph some gorgeous irredescent blue dragonflies (unsuccessfully!) on the creek and noticed when she got back to the shore that a leech had attached itself to her arm, the ruddy thing was sucking her blood.
With some difficulty she pulled the little critter off then horrified some tourists that had just arrived at the falls with her leech story. The poor tourists looked a bit nervous about staying there when they realised there were leeches lurking!

Bamboo Extravaganza

A pioneering farming couple on the Atherton Tablelands are opening their gates tomorrow to the public via the Open Garden Scheme.
The farm is called Asper Park and their speciality is Bamboo, both ornamental and edible. Who could resist a visit after reading the blurb from ABC Far North
"Sample delicious bamboo shoots in marinade and learn the secrets of bamboo production. Picturesque Asper Park is a working farm with over 20 varieties of bamboo including many rare and unusual varieties. The bamboo grove appears like an ethereal living sculpture: wind whispers through skyward-shooting stems; peeling sheaths balance delicately. An avenue of jacarandas leads into the garden, which features shady mature English oaks, plane trees and a palm grove. Shingle-roofed summer houses and weathered pine dwellings evoke a European air..."
MDR & MB are booked in the for 9:30am tour and are looking forward to a sensory overload and tasting some freshly harvested bamboo shoots.

Red Sky at Night, Sailor's Delight

Phew... the MB family is frying in FNQ, 37C in Cairns yesterday (heat index of 41C). Lots of extreme weather events all over our vast continent, with a very unseasonal cold snap in southern Australia, it actually snowed in the Blue Mountains and at Thredbo yesterday.
It's also quite dry in FNQ, but there are flooding rains falling in the south-east of Queensland, it's normally the other way around at this time of year! MB snapped last night's sunset in Cairns, the colour of the sky at dusk was a sight to behold.

Eggs on Steroids

MDR is back from his 12 day whistle stop tour of USA & Nova Scotia (via Japan) and was up bright and early this morning, showing very little sign of jet lag, so off he went to Rustys. Yamagishi eggs are always on the list and MDR loves the Super Jumbo eggs (around $5.00 per dozen), the Japanese guy on the Yamagishi stand even greeted MDR with "Gidday Mate" today, his English is improving no end. The super jumbos often have double yolks (luckily neither MDR nor MB have problems with cholesterol) which is always a delight when one cracks open the egg to find it's a double yolker, for some reason it feels lucky. One egg in particular in today's purchase weighed in at 120grams. MB had picked up some Extra Large Yamagishi eggs (around $4.50 a dozen) during the week so compared one with today's, the XL was about 70grams. As you can see in the picture, the Super Jumbo dwarfs the XL egg.

Halloween

MB couldn't resist posting this pic of first born son and girlfriend Mami taken at a Halloween party on 1st November. FBS hired a white suit and wig and managed to look quite grotesque. Mami did an amazing job with the face paint. Of course the white suit got black face paint on it, however it was water soluble but to be on the safe side FBS took the suit to a local dry cleaners (5 Star Cleaners), who managed to get the face paint out but stained the suit all over with something else. FBS took it back to the costume hire who rejected it, so it was back to the dry cleaners.
FBS mentioned that when he went back the counter staff were drinking cans of premixed Bundy & Cokes, even had a six pack on the counter, sort of gives one an idea of the calibre of these cleaners.
MB became involved when FBS was working and couldn't pick up the suit in order to drop it back to the costume hire, so she dropped in and picked up the suit after it's 2nd clean.
The cleaning was a disaster so MB decided to consult with another cleaners, Alsco, and discovered the most wonderful cleaner, Ray. Ray has cleaned for over 40 years, mostly in London. He took one look at the suit and explained that it had been cleaned in dirty spirit. Ray said to give him two days and he'd have it like new.
A mere 6 hours later he called MB and advised the suit was ready! Sure enough it was spotlessly clean and Ray had even starched it. Amazingly Ray refused to charge for the clean, saying that FBS has been cheated.
Due to Ray's professionalism and generosity a very negative experience had a wonderful outcome.
How many Rays does one encounter? He is a true gentleman.

Taming of the Trivia Queen

MB has enjoyed victory in past trivia games with family and friends and was emboldened enough last night to call Tony Delroy's late night radio quiz show on ABC radio. She often listens to this program and finds many of the questions pretty easy. MB has tried calling before but was never able to get through, last night though she got through on the second attempt.
This particular quiz has 25 questions and contestants drop out once they make a wrong answer. MB listened in as quite a few contestants succeeded then failed, she had no idea when her turn would come up.
At about question 12 the going got tough when Tony Delroy asked what title of a Shakespeare play included an animal in it. MB never studied Shakespeare and was hoping against hope she wouldn't have to try to answer this as similar literarily challenged contestants were dropping like flies. MB could only think of "A Midsummer Night's Dream", "Romeo & Juliet", "Macbeth" and "Hamlet". Sure enough MB's turn came up, MDR heard MB talking on the phone and he was wondering who the hell she was talking to so late at night. Needless to say MB's attempt at radio quiz glory fell apart before it even got off the ground!
MDR tuned in as well and he couldn't think of the answer either. Finally a couple of contestants later, the correct answer was proffered, "Taming of the Shrew". MB had always thought a shrew was some sort of medieval harridan.
The next day MB told first born daughter of her previous nights travails on late night radio and FBD, obviously the better educated one, immediately came up with this answer "Isn't that the play with 'shrew' in the title?"

Iron Horse

Check out little LJ on his "new old" rocking horse. This isn't just any old rocking horse, it's an industrial strength rocker made from scrap metal and car parts lovingly put together by a friend of MB's dear friend, SG. This rocking horse has been entertaining kids for the past 20 years and is still going strong. It's a unique item and sure to be going strong for at least another 20 years.