Made it!

We have made it to the safety of the Term 1 holidays with a big sigh of relief. It has been a struggle to get up this last week, the only consolation being that it is now light in the morning at 6.45am which helps motivate us to get up.

Been doing the usual stuff that weeks and w/ends are made of. We are into Autumn now I guess with swallows heading north, a slight morning chill in the air and mists over the reserve. It is still warm enough to walk around in a T_shirt on the block.

Eric has been trying out his new toy the last few weekends. He saved up all his Xmas money for a .22 rifle. I had to get a firearms license in order to legally own a gun. Shooting is big over here. A very different scene to the UK where most people do not have anything to do with guns unless they are farmers, rich or in a criminal gang. Here lots of people have connections to land and shooting. Possum control is almost a patriotic duty and lots of folk go out blasting ducks when the season starts. There is a big thing about pig hunting round here as well as they run wild in the bush, getting to be big and by all accounts pretty fierce. There are several magazines dedicated solely to pig hunters generally featuring some grinning hunter with the carcase of a big pig draped on his back.

It is this world that Eric wants to enter, and I have to admit that it appeals to some basic instincts in me, so I am happy to go along with his enthusiasm. Probably following on in the way that my dad used to take Dominic and me fishing when we were kids, until we were old enough to go ourselves. We had a go at possum shooting a couple of weeks back in the local reserve, but scored a blank on account of the thickness of the foliage. The next night we were out chasing rabbits in Diggers valley. Again no luck. The following Saturday saw us scooting round the hills up the road after possums. Finally we chanced upon a few hapless possums and Eric shot his first. Stuart got another one and all were happy.

Last weekend we went back to Diggers on Saturday to collect wood that we had hauled in from the hillside. We also cut down some more trees that will sit out in the pasture for a year, then be hauled in and stored for a year in our shed before being burnt. We chopped trees down without a chainsaw and it was hard but pleasant work, just the sound of our saws and axe and the birds. We fixed that by having afun target shoot afterwards shooting about 50 rounds off into the hill. Eric is a better shot than me!

The rest of the weeks have been pretty much work work work, every night and through the weekend. I am pretty satisfied with the results though. The school year is front end loaded work wise, with most of the hard yards going in at the start. Once the juggernaut is moving at a good pace it should be an easy enough matter to keep it going. He says! I organised a trip for the new Year 12 Science course to a local vineyard to see how they make wine. Then we have had a policeman in to do lessons on Forensics to the Year Nines this week.

Chantelle has pictures from her trip to Dunedin to post, so I will hand over to her.
Ciao for now.