The Peaches, peaches and more

I’m beginning to compose this post while on a bus up the east coast. After over a month in the Christchurch/Canterbury area, I’m heading north to a vineyard/sheep farm just a bit south of Blenheim. There are supposed to be beautiful views of the ocean to my right and mountains to my left, but I’m surprised the driver can see where he’s going with the wet, foggy pre-cyclone we’re experiencing. Luckily I still have a big plastic bag from my flight across the USA, so my bag won’t get wet when I get off.

My last nearly-two weeks have been spent with the Peach family, where I’ve learned the joys of eating homemade bread every day and sleeping with hot water bottles in my bed. They have five kids, all of whom have been homeschooled, and two of whom were still at home, which was lots of fun for me. They say they started homeschooling when they heard about all the benefits to the child of having such individual instruction, but I suspect it had something to do with religion as well, since their science books had titles like “Exploring Creation through Human Anatomy and Physiology”. I kept my mouth shut on the subject.

They keep some cows, sheep, and horses on the property, but they basically take care of themselves. I got to work mainly on the peach, apple and pear trees in the yard, which were dropping tons and tons of fruit by the time I got there. Susan, the mom, taught me her basic method of stewing and hot-bottling fruit, and then most days I peeled and cut fruit for over an hour to fill up a big stock pot and get a batch going. We also made tomato relish, which is sort of like a chunky ketchup (but better, in my opinion), and spaghetti sauce that we put in bottles to get stored away. They have a big shelf in the garage and two shelves in the house to hold all their preserves, and they’d probably still be set for 3 years after they stop making them.

Working on a big batch of blackboy peaches

On nicer days, I did work outside, like retraining and tying a clematis vine over a climbing trellis, ripping an invasive vine out of a tree (which made me feel like Tarzan), and weeding various sections of their massive vegetable garden. One of the perks of working outside was that their cats are outdoor-only, and there were seven kittens born just a few weeks before I arrived. It was so so cute to watch them teetering around and playing with each other, and even better to forcibly snuggle them when I wasn’t working.

Sunny in the garden

The smallest kittens

The bigger kittens

More of the garden

I ended up accompanying Susan, Azaria and Josiah to some of their homeschool network events (which were largely made up of other large, Christian families) and got to see a bit more of their lives and the surroundings. One of the more memorable ones was a downhill bikeride through a mountain pass. A couple carfuls of kids and their bikes got driven up to the high point of this road and then we glided downhill back to a campground with a swimming spot. The road had a lot of loose gravel, so it was actually kind of a stressful experience, but there were a few spots with great views and I felt accomplished at the end just for staying upright the whole time.

Bikeride views

I also borrowed a bike for two other rides, one to the beach and one into Rangiora to do a bit of shopping. It felt good to do some long-distance exercise, since my running is still quite limited. Per my physical therapy schedule from my knee surgery in September, I have worked up to running in 2 minute intervals alternated with walking, but I think I’ll transition into short, continuous running soon.

On my last day with the Peaches, we went to a nearby A&P (Agricultural & Pastoral) Show, which was basically a one-day county fair featuring just one town. They had equestrian events, prizes for the best sheep and cows in various categories, sheep shearing competitions, exhibits of the “ugliest vegetable” and “most beautiful three tomatoes” and stuff like that. On the way home, we made a stop to hike to see some Maori paintings. They’re tucked well away under a rock overhang in the middle of some farmer’s fields, so still quite well preserved. Although the art itself wasn’t very impressive, it was cool to imagine people taking shelter under these rocks and making the paintings hundreds of years ago.

Baa baa black sheep

Vegetable animals

Cave paintings

Final views in Canterbury

At this point I’ve arrived at my next hosts, who have the strictest internet policy yet. So, unfortunately, still no pictures. I may have to cave in and go to an internet café at some point in the near future, but we’ll see how it goes. That’s all for now!