Macadamias-- they're nuts!

This week we are doing our work exchange on a macadamia orchard.  The couple that are hosting us have their home, orchards, and a small shop/factory on a piece of land near the Bay of Plenty.
We are working 4 hours a day in return for a room and food. Our work is harvesting and processing the macadamias.  It's pretty interesting to see the differences and similarities between macadamias and pecans.  The nuts have to be picked from the tree, and since this is a 'small' orchard, everything is done by hand, except for husking which is done by a small machine.  Our day begins with breakfast at 7am, then we head down to the factory to husk the nuts from the day before. After that we head over to the trees that need harvesting and pick until lunchtime (around 1pm).  We are only here a week, and can get about 4-5 trees done in our working hours. They will still have a lot of trees to harvest before the spring/summer tourist season starts.  They are currently closed for the winter but sell the nuts here on the property in the summer as well as macadamia spread, brittle, covered in chocolate, etc. as well as local honey and fruit from the orchards. Paul also makes nutcrackers that can come attached to handy trays, made from NZ Rimu wood. Here's their website.

Chris loading the de-husker

Wes sorting out the husked nuts

Weighing before they go into the drying bins

prickly leaves

Coromandel Peninsula

We spent the last week in the Coromandel region. Our first stop was near the very top, a campground called Stony Bay.  100 Campsites and we were the only ones there both nights.  We did the coastal trail, a 6 hour round trip hike around to the north of the peninsula. There were great views from a lot of spots on the trail. After the hike we made some food, and then it started raining- we were stuck inside the van from 4pm till the next morning when we crawled into the front seats and drove out. The weather the whole week after that was mostly rainy and windy.

We spent the week just outside of Thames (pronounced "Tems" apparently), with a really awesome family consisting of the grandma, mom, and high school daughter.  They were super welcoming and we talked a lot about food, and coffee (they used to own a cafe).  We didn't do a whole lot of work around the property since it rained most of the time, but Chris installed a new stove for them, and helped finish the roof over the patio/pizza oven area.He needs to maybe introduce himself as a a power engineer or circuit design engineer or something, because we have found that a lot of people hear 'electrical engineer' and think its a fancy way of saying electrician, and are wondering why the heck you need a Master's degree to be an electrician.  I cooked a lot of the meals and cleaned a bit. We stayed in a separate building from the house. They have chickens, and it was cool being able to have fresh eggs every day. During our free time we hung out at the house, went for some walks, and spent a little time in Thames. There is a weekly farmers market and lots of local shops and cafes.

our sleepout

Sunset from the yard, overlooking the Firth of Thames

keeping warm

One of the afternoons we took a drive and went to hot water beach, where there are hot springs that you can get to at low tide by digging in the sand. 

 We were going to hike to Cathedral Cove, which is one of the 'must see' places in the Coromandel but it started storming pretty hard when we got to the carpark so we went to a winery instead. :)  The guy doing the tastings was really nice and we were the only ones there.  While we were talking to him he mentioned that they do HelpX and I realized that it was one of the places that we were interested in staying at! I had emailed them a couple weeks prior but never heard back so we went to Thames instead.  He said if we're back in the area in the summer we can come and stay.  They have wood fired pizza also and need help during the busy times to make pizzas and work at the bar. Free pizza and homemade apple/feijoa cider. Yum.

not good hiking weather- especially in flip flops

free tastings- wines and local fruit liqueurs

  

 We enjoyed our week in Coromandel, we're going to have to try and come back during the summer because we couldn't really enjoy the great beaches with the winter weather.  A lot of shops/activities shut down for the season too.
At the moment we are staying with a couple who have a macadamia orchard and factory.  Chris and I are helping to harvest the nuts.  It's pretty interesting to see and learn the process, we know now why macadamias are so expensive. We will be here for a week, and I'll do another post in a couple days after I get some photos of what we're doing.

Paihia --> Auckland

We are now back in Auckland, bye bye Northland! Hopefully we'll get a chance to go back to the Bay of Islands in the summer when there is better weather and a little more to do.  Paihia was really nice, a little town right on the water, very much a tourist town and holiday destination.  Lots of shops, cafes, and restaurants. Some were closing for the winter while we were there. The hostel we stayed at, the Saltwater Lodge, was nice, the work was super easy as there were 3 of us working (and 4 the last two days) and hardly any guests since its winter.  The room we got in exchange was a staff dorm, a small room with four bunks that we shared with Marie from Germany, and later Ana from France.  My task was to clean the bathrooms and communal kitchen, and Chris emptied garbage and recycling bins and vacuumed.  Our plan was to also find part time jobs while we were there, but it was too quiet.  Hopefully we'll find a place that we like over the next few weeks so we can work and make some money during the winter months.
The following are photos of our time in the Bay of Islands, its a great place to visit.

fancy pastry- strawberry lamington with cream

Oats with cinnamon apples and chia seed :)

Real coffee.. yum

half of our lovely room

Saltwater lodge Hostel

Russell- across the bay by ferry, NZ's first capitol and now a quaint holiday destination. Lots of B&Bs and cafes.

NZ's oldest church in Russell

Paihia beach, one block from our hostel

Helping out with a barbecue for a student group  at the hostel

Mangroves and boardwalk on a hike

Haruru falls

Stone Store and Rainbow Falls walk in Kerikeri, 30 min North of Paihia

WAITANGI treaty grounds:
We also visited Waitangi treaty grounds, 1 km from Paihia. It's the historic site where the Treaty of Waitangi was signed by Maori chiefs and the British settlers in 1840.  The treaty laid out the way for Maori and British settlers to come together in New Zealand.  Translation problems and different understanding about what the treaty meant for property ownership and government has been under debate even till now.  Read about it more here.
We were able to get into the grounds for free with our work visas, nice to save $50! We did pay for the cultural show and guided tour which were definitely worth it. The culture show had great traditional singing and dancing following a traditional welcome onto the Marae (I have video but its not loading to the blog at the moment...), which we've seen before, but it was still awesome.  The tour was really interesting, it was given by a woman named Denise who is an 8th generation descendant of chief Kawhiti, the first to sign the Treaty. She had a lot of interesting insight into Maori/British relations and knew a lot about her history. She also talked about the significance of the carvings on the marae and in the meeting house, everything tells elaborate stories of the tribes, even the woven panels which were to predict tide and fishing patterns.

From here we will head south/east to the Coromandel peninsula, to the Bay of Plenty and then around the East coast. After that we will be in Feilding, my hometown in 2003 (ten years ago... sheesh.) then to New Plymouth and then Taupo- a busy 4 weeks is coming up.  We will try to do a new post after each homestay we are at. We haven't helped at homestays yet, we've only been working at holiday parks and hostels/motels. It'll be a good change to stay with families in their homes.