return to the sunniest city

sorry for not writting from french pass, but the internet situation was a bit dodgy and i had to buy wireless time but for some reason my ipod can't deal with the blog or something...i've got no answers. it's a mystery. anyway, the french pass was lovely if ridiculously isolated, there wasn't even milk at the little store by the campground because they couldn't get any in from rai valley, it being too far away, so lynn (my host) kept half of her second freezer (or chiller or crisper) full of bags of frozen milk. it was quite impressive the amount of food they had stored up really. two freezers and three refrigerators (not counting the ones in the guests rooms). they could have servived forever, plus the garden. they did feed me quite well though i was not that excited about the work, maid really is what i was, and the wwoofing is supposed to be farm stuff, learning to do new things not making beds with perfectly crisp corners (which i can in fact already do). but it was serene. i would sit on the beach every afternoon when i was dismissed from my housekeeper duties and walk the ten feet to the beach where i would sit and read until i got very hot, and then i would go for my daily swim, to the bouy and back a few times. i was warned that the water was cold but to me it felt like bathwater compaired to mendocino. after the first day and the dolphins nothing very exciting happened.

i found a bird skeleton outside my caravan and i think it was a weka which made me a little sad as i've begun to get rather fond of them. wekas, are midsized birds looking sort of like a chicken/duck cross with a very emu remeniscent head movement. they don't fly but they do hop and flutter, and prefure to take the most direct route to whereever they are going, even if it means walking over or through something. they are also very curious. i went into my caravan to get a sweatshirt and one had wandered in behind me through the open door and was nosing through my dirty laundry on the floor. they make a racket when defending their territory from eachother (the noise they make is the only way to distinguish between males and females) and they are so dim and trustworthy that they are very easy prey to any sort of predetors including dogs and housecats, which they are roughly the same size as. this has led to them being equally dwindling in numbers as the famed kiwi birds, at least on the north island. i chase several out of the garden yesterday. they like to peck at everything and leave a trail of devistation in thier wake. i caught a younger one that had wandered into a corner and gotten confused. it as warm and it's heart was fluttering fiercly under my fingers. the next morning i found a single pristine tail feather on my doorstep.