King of The Road

Cyclists are numerous in New Zealand. Long distance touring cyclists are less so. I met this gentleman of the road quite a few times when I went to Gisborne. These photos were taken in Tolaga Bay a (very) small town North of Gisborne.

Tom Parker Fountain: Marine Parade

I drove home last night via Marine Parade. I'm glad I did. Believe it or not I had never seen the Tom Parker Fountain (so named because he donated it in 1936) lit up before. Well I may have done but I don't recall it and I'm certain I didn't photograph it. This is it during the day looking South along the gardens on Marine Parade to The Soundshell:

And this is it last night:

Very New Zealand

Mission View Gardens

Wendy and I had lunch at Mission View Gardens which is a garden centre with a large and splendid café facility. Actually it's more of a café with a garden centre facility nowadays. I have never seen a plant sold. It is, however, a place at which my brother would love to have coffee and wander round taking photos and enjoying the ambience. After, of course, he and I had finished the crossword.

I'm a Big Dog, I Am.

On Saturday evening Misty came down to me whilst The Family went walkabouts. Now, whilst I love animals I'm not known as a great lover of domestic pets. Which is rather odd because I love Briagha (Pat and Dave's dog - and I'd say I did even if I didn't 'cos Pat wouldn't forgive me otherwise) and I was even getting attached to Misha before I left my Island home. And I absolutely loved BP (the cat I inherited on Lewis years ago and who died in my arms in 2005) who seemed to think he was a doat (a cat with the loving nature of a dog). So an evening spent with a happy, tiny bundle of fluff who seemed to enjoy my company was a good experience. But my lifestyle in two countries just wouldn't suit keeping a domestice pet even if I became a convert.

I'm a BIG dog (well, bitchlet, actually)

Hello. What do you want?

Who brought all these?

Oh the choice!

I think I'll have a chew on this one

Statues at the Harbour Entrance in Gisborne

By the entrance to Gisborne Harbour there are two statues: one of Captain Cook and one of 'Young Nick' pointing towards the white cliffs across the bay. Nicolas Young was Cook’s cabin boy and was the first member of the crew to sight land - Cook named the headland ‘Young Nick’s Head’.

Bookshop Café

This is the principle bookshop in Gisborne's main street. Needless to say I visited it (and bought a book). What really intrigued me though was the lovely café on the first floor with its outside balcony giving a view of the main street in both directions.

A Village Called Whangara

Earlier in the week I went to Whangara (wh is pronounced f): a village 29 km North of Gisborne on New Zealand's North East coast. It is the home of a Maori tribe known as Ngati Kanohi, whose earliest ancestor arrived on the back of a whale. This is where the book and film Whalerider is set (and shot) and the people of Whangara are the people you see on the screen. They're whale people. They have lived on that piece of land for a thousand years. Their sense of matemate-a-one is very is very strong In Maori culture the phenomenon of matemate-a-one describes the sickness experienced when parted from tribal land—a grieving for place. It is beyond love. It's a sickness that affects the mind and the soul, a primal response to and a craving for a particular place. For home.

We didn't go down into the Village because so many people do that it would, to us, have felt like an invasion of privacy. So I contented myself with a feeling of the place and photos from above using my telephoto lens.

Waitangi Day

Today is Waitangi Day. It is a public holiday in New Zealand. For those of you who are new to my blog or (like me) can't recall what I said last year I blogged on Waitangi Day on this day last year and, earlier, on Maori and Pakeha .

The Monarch Butterfly

Nearly a year ago I blogged on butterflies I regularly see (saw) in New Zealand. I notice that in that posting I mentioned the Swan Plant that I also mentioned in a posting a few weeks ago. Because I had never seen one in reality until a few weeks ago I didn't connect the two. Anyway last week I was up at Pukatapu School taking the children swimming (it was the school summer holidays) and I went into the native garden which is rather run down and overgrown but a wonderful haven for the Monarch Butterfly. I see Monarchs all the time all over the place here but until that moment I'd only once seen one at rest (an d the battery in my camera failed at that very moment!). So last week I managed my first ever photograph of a Monarch Butterfly and its caterpillars in the wild.