Monthly Archives: April 2011

Another restless, broken sleep night last night. The motel walls are paper thin – otherwise the accommodation was quite good – warm and the shared kitchen worked well. Unfortunately the foreign couple through the wall got in after 2:00am and chatted with each other for a while and then got up again at 4:30am. It was such a relief when they left and we got a good night’s sleep on Saturday night. Our other IDS colleagues in the same complex were equally delighted.

Today our bus took us up north to Wanaka to see some of the autumn colours there. The IDS experts found plenty to enthuse over – there’s nothing like a mysterious tree to classify to keep them happy. In the evening we all (36 of us) went up in the Queenstown gondola to the restaurant perched above the town and had a pleasant buffet dinner. The view was excellent and the food plentiful and almost all gluten-free.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:8°C—18°C; no rain [?] 06:30

Today’s trip was by bus up to Glenorchy (50 mins) and then by launch 15 mins across to Pigeon Island for a light lunch and enjoyable walk through the regenerating forest to a stand of mature beech trees. The tramping hut near the jetty nestled in the bush and was home to wekas. There are no possums, goats, rats, rabbits, mice, cats and the last stoat was trapped ten years ago. A weka came out to look at us; joined later by another which ran around the lunch tables. We saw maybe another four or five wekas on our walk and later, returning from our ramble,one of the resident hut wekas actually pecked my boots; they were not exactly shy. As we sat having afternoon tea these hut wekas brought out their two large fluffy chicks for our approval.

Pigeon Island in lake Wakatipu is about a mile from the shore and is predator free. After a couple of major fires caused by campers in the last few years, it is also open-fire-free. The Pigeon Island trust have planted something like 20,000 trees in their efforts to get the forest going again after the logging and clearing of 100 years ago.

After Pigeon Island it was a further 90 minutes by bus to the entrance to the world famous (in NZ) Routeburn track. There we went for a short 60 minute walk on a loop track through the bush, being surprised by the tameness of thre local South Island robins – too tame for their own good I would have thought.

Then it was back to Queenstown for the IDS (International Dendrologist Society) NZ chapter’s AGM and meal in the Tatler hotel. Brain from Australia gave a slide show from his recent IDS trip to California – trees figured rather highly in his shots but it was a professional and quite interesting talk. Afterwards everyone rushed off, most to see the rest of the royal wedding on their motel TVs.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:1°C—15°C; 0.1mm rain [?] 06:30

We left the car in the Napier airport long-term car park and took a flight up to Auckland and from there on to Queenstown. The only somewhat stressful moment was when I realised I had in my pocket my treasured “Java” penknife, given to me by my colleagues in Sun Microsystems – and we’d just checked our luggage in. Karola eventually calmed me down from fulminating at airports and the foolish discomfort of travelling and threatening to return home on the next plane by suggesting we post it to ourselves. We did that and the rest of the flight was blissfully uneventful; we even got to hear Rodney Hide (NZ Act party) announce on TV that he was standing aside for Don Brash, the ex-National party leader and ex-head of Treasury who basically turfed Rodney out.

Got to Queenstown, got shuttle to the motel which was spartan but quite adequate except for, as we subsequently discovered, inadequate sound proofing. We met up with some of the other dendrologists; some stayed at the motel but we went down town and had an absolutely first class, and not very expensive, fish diner at the Fishbone restaurant. A really good fish dinner.

Oh, the Napier-Auckland-Queenstown route was quite a bit cheaper than the more direct Napier-Wellington-Queenstown route but if there were a next time I’d much prefer the Wellington stopover just to avoid all the security at Auckland.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:10°C—13°C; 0.1mm rain [82.0] 06:30

SwimGym for me only today. Dentist at 9:00 am; Karola hair appointment at 10:15 am.

The two young women visitors, Laura & Laura, went off to work at the pack-house down the road – started at 8:00 am and finished around 4:30 pm. They ae going to live in the cottage (w/o hot water, but with a loo, running water, heater, Internet, fridge) until the weekend when they set off for more adventures.

Karola and I got ready for the trip to Queenstown tomorrow. I put combination locks on the farm gates and set out food for Laurie and Enid to give the cat, chooks and geese.

It rained steadily all day. The hanging branch up in the big oak came down at breakfast time – no damage, no injuries. It was modest compared to the earlier branches, only 200mm thick.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:10°C—13°C; 20.9mm rain [81.8] 06:30

Rained steadily all day. Lauri went out sightseeing most of the day and spent rest catching up on their e-mails. They’ve got themselves jobs at Willie Thow’s Matipo packhouse for a few days.

Karola and I went for lunch at Pernel Fruit World.

More programming for me – great fun.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:11°C—13°C; 71.8 mm rain [82.3] 06:30

Rainy day. We were pleased that Laura Plewe (Kristof Kloeckner’s niece – grew up in East Germany) and her friend Laura ___ (from Bermuda and grew up in England) who are touring New Zealand came to stay the night.

I programmed all day – the knotty little problem that made me restless last night is solved.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:12°C—17°C; 39.3 mm rain [81.9] 06:30

SwimGym.

Karola spent much of the day with her sheep, including the unenviable task of cleaning the rear ends of 16 of her lambs. No fly-strike found, which is a blessing. In the evening Karola compiled a dossier on her sheep drenching from the Karamu farm log. I programmed all day.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:12°C—22°C; 2.4 mm rain [81.9] 06:30

A quiet day; sent out a few photos of Bicka, mainly to people who’d encountered her – usually because they visited Karamu.

Karola put up electric fence round the lawn – the ewes will likely get a spell there as the grass is quite long. Then she and I sorted through the lambs and selected 16 of them to drench (Cydectin, withholding for meat of 10 days): #002, #003, #004, #005, #006, #012, #014, #016, #017, #018, #020, #022, #025, #028, #042, #043.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather:7°C—20°C; no rain [81.7] 06:30

Karola nursed Bicka on the bed in the cottage from 10:00 pm last night; Bicka died around 03:10 am. Her big heart just couldn’t keep going.

Talking to one of the Massey vets today she said they’d been thinking probably if Bicka were to die soon it’d be better for her than their chemical cocktails, even those which were intended to make her life a little easier.

Bicka, whelped 16 December 2003; came to us at the end of February and has been with us almost constantly ever since – a huge part of our lives and very affectionate. We miss her a great deal. The house and car and everywhere is just full of her stuff and she’s such a big part of our every day routines.

Karola and I buried her out near the Canary Island pine where Karola will plant a Liriodendron (Tulip Tree)

Not much else to report today – Gary came over and dispatched #041 and took the meat for his dogs; I buried #041 and #045.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 8°C—20°C; no rain [81.5] 06:30

SwimGym for me, first thing. Karola went after lunch and swam her kilometre.

Tony Fletcher rang while we were away to say that his wife Anne had died in the early hours of wednesday morning after her long illness.

Bicka was relatively calm this morning and I gave her her usual Prednisone 5mg plus what I thought was the second day of her first chemotherapy stint. She is to get a blood test in seven days time to see how she’s reacting to the drugs. I then reported back to Jonathan Bray at Massey as requested. Early this evening he rang back – he’d been mulling over what I said including that Bicka had had her tablets OK. But she was only supposed to have the second set of tablets in three weeks time – so I have double-dosed the poor dog. The printed instructions made perfect sense either way – depending on whether you thought each treatment of tablets was a short course over several days or just a single dose. No-one really knows what to expect now.

Tonight Bicka is pretty crook – just because of the breathing difficulty, not to do with the medication as far as we can tell. She hasn’t eaten, and has stopped drinking. Karola is nursing her on the old bed in the cottage. Tomorrow we have appointment to get antibiotics for Bicka (key consequence of the double dose will be seriously reduced capability to ward off germs) and an anti-nausea injection. Nausea is the likely reason for her not eating and she is to have an injection each day for five days to reduce it.

We took a quick stroll around the lambs; 43 lambs but #045 is dead and #041 is looking mighty low. No obvious cause, no external symptoms.

What a day.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Our meeting with Alison Dangerfield went off quite well. There are two parts to the laws we need to comply with, both administered by the NZHPT:
1) The traditional ‘listed building’ issue of getting endorsement for our resource consent application because the structure and its immediate surroundings are considered to be of heritage value. So, avoiding radical modification of the most ‘typical’ aspects of design of a listed building, preferably not moving it; at least keeping its relationship to the context of buildings and other site features, maintaining original materials where practical.

2) Archaeological: this seems more aimed at preserving significant sites of Maori history. It applies principally to sites of buildings built before 1900.

Alison Dangerfield is our contact for 1); Kathryn Hurran for 2). Alison seems willing to trade a letter of intent from us to enter a covenant with NZHPT to preserve certain aspects of Karamu for her NZHPT letter of recommendation to the council considering our resource consent application. For 2), Karola has already engaged one of the local approved archaeologists, Elizabeth Pishief, who will begin next week with a visit to determine what archaeological activity is warranted. I’m still concerned that this will all take 2 – 3 weeks before we can even begin the 20-day minimum period for getting the resource consent.

Weather: 11°C—17°C; no rain [?] 06:30

Delivered Bicka well before 8:00 am and left her with the vets for her CAT scan, biopsy, and first dose of chemotherapy. In Bicka’s case the chemotherapy has no capability to cure her but may be able to make her more comfortable through her final months. There’s no indication that she is in any pain apart from the restriction of her bronchial tubes making her breathless after even modest exertion or excitement.

Then Karola went to Lethenty in Bulls and spent the morning with Hilary Haylock. I, meanwhile, went to Harry’s factory in Bulls and chatted with Chloe and Tessa, then up to the farm and had coffee with Harry and discussed some of his very smart latest inventions.

I collected Karola and Hilary and we met up with Laura and Chloe for lunch at Mothered Goose (the old BNZ bank building) in Bulls. After lunch Karola and I went for a walk at Mt Lees and then off to pick up Bicka as soon as Jonathan Bray (vet) rang to say she was ready to leave. We drove quietly back to Karamu arriving on the dot of 6:00pm. The prognosis for Bicka is not good; it’s a particularly bad form of lung cancer, very hard to treat and already widespread, but there’s hope that the chemotherapy could make a significant improvement in her happiness over the next few weeks or months.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 10°C—22°C; no rain [?] 06:30

We left, Karola, Bicka and me, for Massey at 8:01 am to attend a consultation with Jonathan Bray, vet, at the Massey vet Training Hospital in Palmerston North.

Jopnathan confirmed Roger McKinley’s diagnosis from Bicka’s x-rays and suggested a CAT scan and biopsy would give him more detail and more precise knowledge of the type of lung cancer Bicka has. We were booked in for the next day at 8:00am.

We met Kaz and Yvonne at Brie Cafe in PN for lunch; Kaz (with Amy’s dog) joined us later in Feilding for a walk from Kowhai Park along the Makino river bank past the Manfield race track, and afterwards we went back to Ngaio Glen for afternoon tea.

Afterwards we went to Burleigh who had kindly invited us for dinner and the night so that we could take Bicka in to the Vet hospital in the morning. The meal was one of Chloe’s usual splendid beef dinners; Tessa and Pete, Harry, Chloe, and Laura were there.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 3°C—17°C; no rain [81.7] 06:30

SwimGym. Later Karola went into Hastings, shopping. I spent the day programming, tinkering as usual. Ewes were allowed in for another day under the big oak.

Massey University’s Vet Training Hospital contacted me in the morning and we’ve now got an appointment for Bicka over there tomorrow at 10:00 am. She will have up to an hour tomorrow and may have to stay there for a few days, depending on the chosen path forward. Jonathan Bray is our specialist.

Jenny Hendery came for a chat and her husband Noel, who had dropped her off while he did some business over this way, returned for late morning tea and some delicious gluten-free scones Karola baked today. We talked about, I ranted about, connecting up old TV and VCR equipment with modern digital TVs.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Karola had a long and useful conversation with one of the two local archeologists suggested by NZHPT for the work associated with our cottage,
Elizabeth Pishief.

Weather: 8°C—12°C; 6.3 mm rain [82.3] 06:30

Much of the time a glorious autumn day, sunny and cool. Karola did a morning of weeding round the 133 entrance; I put up electric fence for the ewes around the big oak. Mainly it was a slothful day. Bicka about the same. I did ring Vets and leave message saying that although Bicka was much improved over Thursday night we still would like a referral to the specialists at Massey University.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 8°C—23°C; no rain [81.8] 06:30

With the extra medicine Bicka seems much happier – not exactly running round but the tail does wag and she’s eating her food. Wet day mainly so I continued with my programming inside.

An ambulance arrived quietly at the orchard – I notified Alan Ladbrooke but it wasn’t his family so must be Willie Thow’s team. I went up later, picked some big Granny Smiths off the tree that’s “gone back to its roots” and found out that it was a tractor accident where one of the pickers had been hit – bad bruising but no bones broken and he’s off to hospital for a while.

The Granny Smiths became delicious baked apple for pudding.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 11°C—19°C; 3.9 mm rain [81.6] 06:30

SwimGym for me but Karola stayed behind to look after a very sad little dog. Bicka had a rotten night, waking up with fearful wracking breaths and several times coughing up mucus etc – not pleasant for all concerned. We were up and tending her 5 – 6 times during the night. Unsurprisingly we whisked her into the Vets and he took another x-ray and agreed she was pretty bad. I’d already given Bicka a double dose of her medicine in the morning and this may have kicked in by the time we got her to the Vets because by tea time she was much less subdued. She is now on double dose of Prednizone and 40mg of a diuretic but Roger McKinley, the vet, is sure she has an advancing cancer of the lung and could point out the main tumour on the x-ray. I’ve asked if we can take her to a specialist and so Roger intends to get us a referral to someone in Massey soonest.

Bicka had to stay at the Vets all afternoon so we dropped her off and went for lunch at Cornucopia/Taste. Bicka was very pleased to be reunited with us around 5:00 pm.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Alison Dangerfield, Heritage Advisor – Architecture, NZHPT (04) 802-0002
Kathryn Hurren, Central Region Archaeologist, NZHPT (04) 494-8324

Les called to say he’d had an excellent conversation with Katheryn yesterday and that he believed that she believed we could work in parallel on the council and the NZHPT requirements for approval, and they should both take no more than about 20 business days.

Alison called a little later, independently, to set up a meeting with us (and Les) next Thursday at 10:00 am to discuss the NZHPT requirements and probably the advantages of covenanting.

Les sent through documents from Katheryn such as the application form and description of the assessment process.

Carl Baker came round mid afternoon to check measurements for his quote for the cottage move.

Weather: 10°C—22°C; no rain [81.6] 06:30

Karola had her afternoon tea party with local Oak Avenue wives this afternoon: Louise (Louise and Brian Cope, about to buy Craig Vernon’s place, next door to the north), Janet Scott (widow neighbour to the south), Karin Saunders (The Stables, opposite) , and Sue Hills (next to The Stables and her husband, John Hills, sank our homestead bore in the mid 1980s). It all went very amiably – much laughter and animated chatting.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Our planned meeting with Carl Baker, Hawkes Bay Home Removals, Les Clapcott and Brett Phillips of Clapcott Consultancy, architects, and our builder, Paul Libby began at 8:30 am here. We agreed on the responsibilities and tasks for the cottage move which Les is anticipating could go ahead in about a month’s time.

Les has been on the phone to Alison Dangerfield of Historic Places Trust (NZHPT) because we need their agreement before the council will consider our application for resource consent to move the cottage more than 35 metres from the homestead (we want to move it 49 metres). From his conversation it seemed that NZHPT could add much delay and expense into our plans but Les will continue to push for separating any NZHPT convenant discussions and archeological surveying from the cottage move, allowing the move plans to proceed in parallel.

Weather: 8°C—21°C; 0.2 mm rain [81.6] 06:30

Kaz rang about 8:30 am as requested but declined our offer of a ride to Karamu and three days of tuition about computers – email and cellphone and the like. We called Bridget to wish her Happy Birthday but she was out.

Very good start off to Karamu – all packed and on our way by 10:00 am. We went by way of the Wairarapa and Takapau Route 50 – retracing our steps to Wellington last Friday.

We got back around 3:30 in plenty of time to check the stock and unpack before nightfall. Bicka was unwell and fretful on the trip but had a much needed bio-break just the other side of the Rimutakas.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 5°C—23°C; no rain [?] 06:30

Karola went to see Gwyn and the new baby Miriam this morning.

Bicka really isn’t faring well; her walks are short and on the level.

In the afternoon we went to Bridget’s for a spot of babysitting and a meal. I dropped Karola off and went to Mary’s and set up her printer and some other settings that made the screen brighter and easier to use. Back at Bridget’s we had a solid rack-of-lamb roast.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 7°C—21°C; 0.1 mm rain [?] 06:30

Monday with no SwimGym – withdrawal symptoms already. But Bridget kindly suggested a walk up KauKau which we did in about an hour and a half, talking most of the way about our combined learning programming project.

Pleasant evening meal with the Rashbrookes but no Miriam except for a couple of photos.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 6°C—23°C; no rain [?] 06:30

Charles and Radha arrived mid morning as arranged – they spontaneously turned up last night just as Kirsty & Bruce arrived and that’s when we agreed to meet today. Charles is v. positive that, after today’s discussions, he has enough to be able to design and build the replacement outside steps to the front door. He plans to start in a few days time.

Gill & Ben and Karola & I met Mary off her flight from Nelson at 3:30 pm. We all had afternoon tea at G&B’s, Seatoun Heights then K&I took Mary home to Karori and I did some setup on her new second-hand computer before we retired back to Days Bay for the night.

While I looked at Mary’s computer, Karola visited Maryna Mews, over here visiting relations from Australia and staying with friends in Wgtn.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 5°C—18°C; 0.1 mm rain [?] 06:30

Bridget and family joined us for lunch at Chocolate Dayz in Days Bay. We rounded off a relaxing day by inviting Kirsty & Bruce out for a meal of gluten-free sausages and then to watch episode 6 of “Lewis”.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 7°C—19°C; no rain [?] 06:30

SwimGym and then a quiet morning packing and down to Wellington in the afternoon. We met up with Annemarie More at the Silver Spoon in Silverstream for dinner – expensive but the food was good.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today

Weather: 5°C—17°C; no rain [81.6] 06:30

The Braeburns are still not picked and there are about three rows of Pacific Queens to go as well. There’s lots of grass in the orchard. I locked the exterior gates in preparation for our trip to Wellington planned for tomorrow and attempted to count the sheep at the same time as locking the gates and taking Bicka for a walk around the orchard. I am one lamb short at 42 but all 38 ewes and Piglet and #630 are present and pretty much correct.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Les e-mailed to say that we’d got part of the consents, the building consent had come through leaving only the minor resource consent for going slightly outside the default rules for a secondary dwelling on the same piece of land.

Meanwhile Karola has her “affected persons” approval signed and has Craig Vernon’s one too. Janet Scott expects to get her daughter to sign for her tomorrow, due to her broken wrist – the council confirmed that would be OK.

Weather: 3°C—12°C; 4.4 mm rain [80.3] 06:30

SwimGym as usual. Big, but short, hailstorm with thunder etc had me bailed up out in the paddock under an oak tree for half an hour. Not sure what it’ll have done to the remaining apples. It was the oak next to the Canary Island pine which is much taller so I hoped my oak wouldn’t get hit by lightening.

Karola went to a local meeting about the water resource consents tonight – all rather slow going and not very precise, she reported.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Les called and came round just after breakfast with the package for Karola to take to the neighbours – the “affected persons” who need to be consulted about our plans. There was a minor correction to be made and so we got the final package mid afternoon and Karola began her rounds. She spoke to Janet Scott and, apart from her fractured wrist making it impossible to sign anything, she approves. Craig was out till tomorrow.

Weather: 9°C—20°C; 6.5 mm rain [81.5] 06:30

A spot of rain and a heavy shower or two with hail, thunder, and lightning. We went into Hastings, Cornucopia, for an excellent light lunch and to pick up Karola’s bread.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Les called and came round just before lunch. He’d been talking to Alison Dangerfield in Historic Places Trust in Wellington and relayed a suggestion from her that we enter into a covenant with HTP about the Karamu site in total. It might be something to consider in parallel with our cottage activities but, as Les suggested, we’d want her approval to continue as planned with the cottage without completing such a covenant.

Weather: 3°C—20°C; 5.1 mm rain [80.5] 06:30

SwimGym Monday.

Edith (the tall woman) and Mabel from Meticulous Maids came as planned this morning, sent by their boss Sally Pearce.

Gary came mid morning and dispatched poor old #676 suffering from permanent ill health and now facial ezcema.

Karola visited first Janet Scott, neighbour to the south, who has a broken wrist, and then Laurie and Enid McDermott, our quite old farmlet minders.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 12°C—24°C; 5.3 mm rain [80.8] 06:30

Bicka not too well today – perhaps missing her pill yesterday morning contributed. We stayed home and caught up on chores. Ewe #676, one of the nine Texels known as the Sudoku, has facial eczema and will be dispatched by Gary (of Frances and Gary – Rowena’s relations I think) tomorrow morning. That particular ewe has been very much under the weather (pun not intended) for a couple of years so it’s not entirely unexpected.

The Cottage Refurbishment

I updated the site plan and sent it off to Les and Brett.

Weather: 16°C—23°C; no rain [81.2] 06:30

Karola entertained about 20 of the tree croppers gathering from across NZ for their annual meeting; this afternoon’s field visit was to the Colenso graves in the Napier graveyard and to Karamu to hear about and see the notable trees here. All went smoothly.

The Cottage Refurbishment

Nothing to report today.

Weather: 12°C—18°C; 0.2 mm rain [80.4] 06:30

SwimGym and then, after breakfast, the finishing of clearing the bricks and rubble. Karola went to Napier and fetched Mark and we worked from 11:00 am until 3:00 pm. I think we did five more lads of 100+ bricks to the depot by the 121 entrance and we took oner final heaped trailer load of broken bricks to Greenways. Karola helped and also got rid of most of the finer rubble onto the septic tank.

Later we went to Napier, dropped off Mark, and then back to Hastings via Karamu. In Hastings I picked up my weekly gluten-free bread order and we both shopped in New World for the weekend’s groceries.

The Cottage Refurbishment

We communicated with our architect Les about the information needed to get the neighbours to approve of our plans for the cottage. Later I also sent him pictures of the bricks from the cottage chimney – before and after – to reassure him we’d have the rubble gone before any council inspectors came to research the request for building permission.

Weather: 11°C—22°C; 0.4 mm rain [80.7] 06:30