Last weekend we headed south over the Mangamukas in the brilliant autumn sunshine. It was the first weekend of decent weather we had had in several. We were heading for a tree nursery that was described as being in Waipu, but which was actually dozens of km away on the otehr side of State Highway 1 up in the hills south of Whangarei. No matter as this very generous nursery had put a small piece into the free newspaper saying that they were giving away 93 lots of 100 native trees to any land owners who cared to apply for them. I duly put in an application and was later stoked to get a phone call saying that I had won a lot.
The nursery was stacked full of very healthy looking trees of lots of different species. We loaded up our 100 and thanked the kind lady and drove off. We now have 100 holes to dig! I have put in about 10 so far in the last week. The plan is to have them in 3 places: one load as a south west wind break on Stuart Island, another third as a windbreak for the house itself and a final group on the road edge to give us more privacy.
After visiting the nursery we popped into Waipu caves not far away. The cave goes in quite a way and had huge stalactites and mites and a stream flowing out of it. The setting reminded me of Woodwell in Silverdale, except the trees growing up the limestone cliffs were totara instead of yew.
We headed for Whangarei after that and shopped for clothes. Burger King for the boys and then we belted back home.
In the local news this week: work has started on the new community centre. Our tech block at school has been knocked down to make way for a new one.
