___________________ Whangarei Weather In May _______________________

Nah.... This is actually Iceland; which is how it feels here in Whangarei at the moment ........ Iceland.

_________________________ POSITIVE THINGS ________________________

If you watch and listen to the daily news you could convince yourself that the world has gone completely stark raving mad. But happily among the mayhem and madness most of the world continues to live productive and positive lives; working, creating and generally enjoying themselves as they live out their own truth and make the most of the context they live in.

I came across this video and thought it expresses something of that continuity.
I like the name of this lovely little ship. 

___________ SOUTHERN SOJOURN (7) #Royalcam live stream ____________

I am jumping ahead here a little on my Southern Sojourn story. I was prompted to do this post by a news item on last nights TV One News. This is  24 / 7 'Live Cam' coverage of a Royal Albatross chick (and from time to time its parents) on Tiaroa Head at the entrance to Dunedin Harbour. To date it is not known whether it is a boy or a girl Albatross.

What you are seeing in the live cam shots is the harbour stretching inland in a south westerly direction towards Dunedin city in the distance. If you turned the 'Live Cam' 180 degrees in the opposite direction you would be looking eastwards to the seaward side of the headland and the Pacific Ocean.

I was in Dunedin 5 weeks ago and shot this photograph (below) of Tiaroa Headland from the seaward side. The Albatross chick is sited to the left of Tiaroa Head Lighthouse.

If you would like to officially name this Royal Albatross you can enter a competition to do so here: http://www.doc.govt.nz/namethechick If you win you get to fly to Dunedin to see the growing chick.

If you enter the competition remember you can't name the big bird ' (Sir / Dame) Alby Fleetwing Pelagic' as I have entered this name myself:

Sir / Dame ? - Alby is of course a 'Royal' Albatross - having a Knighthood and a Royal Warrant from her majesty to fly in the Southern Ocean as a Royal Albatross.... but Alby is definitely not a member of the Royal family.

Alby? - Short for Albatross (You knew that of course).

Fleetwing? - Two reasons. 1 - An Albatross is very fleet of wing i.e fast and nimble when flying. 2 - The word 'Fleet' makes a passing reference to the wonderful music of the band Fleetwood Mac and their great guitar work 'Albatross'.

Pelagic? - An Albatross is a 'Pelagic' bird. Apart from times of breeding and raising chicks, it lives and has its being in the open sea.

FLEETWOOD MAC - ALBATROSS

______________________ SOUTHERN SOJOURN (6) ______________________

Bill Richardson's Transport World is an interesting visit if you are in the deep south of Southland New Zealand. Apparently this transport museum is the largest private collection of it's type in the world. It is a privately owned collection of over 300 trucks and 150 petrol bowsers, a significant Henry Ford car, a V8 collection, VW Kombis, Pedal Cars, Wearable Arts and much more displayed under cover in over 10,000sqm of sheds.

I thought with a few modifications that this old North American petrol tanker would make quite a nice campervan.

Another option would be to fill it up with petrol and see how far you could drive it before you needed to refill it.

 1907 Ford touring car.

 1950s Ford Thunderbird (Left and a similar vintage Plymouth (Or is it a Chrysler?).

This is either a Cadillac, a Studebaker, an Impala or a Ford Fairlane. I am sure someone out there knows.

 One of Mr Henry Ford's cars that started it all.

My Standard 6 teacher Bill Liddy drove a grey coloured V8 Coupe just like this. He wasn't very impressed in 1964 when we used a couple of pieces of cardboard and some crayons and fitted a set of "L" plates to his car. Mr Liddy who was a great and influential teacher of mine drove a long wheel based truck version of this car in North Africa during WW2 during his time with the Long Range Desert Group.

 They don't make them like they used to. This is what I call a real Ute.

 I could put a sailing dinghy and a whole lot of other kit besides on one of these.

 A Bevy of V8 coupes to choose from and so shiny I almost had to put on my sunglasses.

A very red pedal car from a large collection that was on display.

 Another excellent example of a 1950s Ford Ute.

 In the 1940s there would have been fleets of these buses serving various towns and cities in NZ.

 The red truck on the left completed its working life in Mossburn in Southland.

 Yes, I am tempted to make a silly remark.

 Otautau is a small town in Southland.

 An old timer from the town of Clyde. I am old enough to remember the brown number plates.

 Early example of a Nissan diesel heavy haulage truck.

A rumble seat (American English), dicky seat, dickie seat or dickey seat (British English), also called a mother - in - law seat, is an unholstered exterior seat which folds into the rear deck of a two seat pre - World War 11 automobile, and seats one or two passengers. When unoccupied, the space under the seat's lid could be used for storing luggage..........

............. I know all of this because I looked it up on Wikipedia (So it MUST be true).

If you are in Invercargill Southland, New Zealand then this Museum is worth a visit.

______________________ SOUTHERN SOJOURN (5) ______________________

In the main street of Invercargill NZ is E. Hayes and Sons Ltd which is a hardware, homeware and giftware shop. It is also a museum of sorts. 

E Hayes and Sons Ltd contains among its staple retail fare a generous display of not only memorabilia from the film 'THE WORLDS FASTEST INDIAN' but a number of old cars and motorcycles spanning the 20th century. 

 

Burt Munroe's original Indian motorcycle (above) is kept within a glass case (hence the reflection in the photo).

A streamlined replica of the outer shell that the motorbike is placed into for its record breaking runs on the Salt Flats in the USA.

This old Chevrolet was used by the actor Anthony Hopkins (who played the motorcyclist Bert Munro) to tow the worlds fastest Indian motorbike to the Bonneville Salt Flats.

A rather nice early Indian motorbike.

This is an Ariel 'Square Four' which I remember from the old Christchurch days. They were used by the local Traffic 'Cops'. There was a distinctive black radio box with an aerial mounted on top behind the seat. I can remember being stopped a couple of times on my Triumph Tiger 200 to discuss exemplars of motorcycle riding.
 

I think this is an early Model T Ford, but I am willing to be corrected.

A beautiful 1950s Ford Thunderbird - I'll have two please.

One of the stores early delivery vans.

 

E Hayes is now a 'Hammer Hardware' franchise. If you are passing through Invercargill the shop and museum is well worth a visit.

______________________ MARINER'S DINGHY (3) _______________________

It has taken me a couple of days to sand Mariner's dinghy back to the original white gel coat finish. All my fingers have lost a layer of skin from clutching the sandpaper firmly in a sanding block (I should learn to wear gloves) and are a bit sensitive. My shoulders ache and I now have the daunting task of turning the dinghy upright and dealing to its cavernous inside. Only after completing the inside of the dinghy will I be ready to start the real work of repair. But shipmates I'm not complaining, because, a labour of love is, well, a labour of love. I can't begin to explain what a joy it is to be doing something as interesting and totally absorbing as sanding  LOL. (Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear).

______________________ MARINER'S DINGHY (2) _______________________

You know the old saying, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step", you know the drill - stop procrastinating and just make a start, nah you don't need another beer and an hours strategic thinking time, just pick up the bloody sand paper and get on with it.

So I got on with it. It has been quite pleasant work except for having to sand the last owners botched up paint job. The person who I bought the dinghy off a few years ago painted over the gel coat with a single pack paint to make it look good for a quick sale on TradeMe the online site where I purchased it. This has flaked off in big sheets on the inside of the dinghy and has turned a chalky yellow on the outside. So I am sanding it back to the original gel coat with wet and dry sandpaper. I will repaint with two pack undercoat and top coat.

So there are a number of jobs on the go at the moment.

- Sand, repair and paint Mariner's dinghy.

- Sand the recently fiberglassed trailing edge of the Starlings centerboard that took a bit of a beating over summer so as to be ready for the first of the Winter series of races this weekend.

- Wash and clean the outside of Mariner as she is looking decidedly shabby and make a start on the long awaited great engine repair  ( I really will need a couple of beers and some hours of strategic motor repair time for this job).

But Shipmates I'm not complaining - there's never a dull moment here at Smiths' outdoor Boatyard.

______________________ SOUTHERN SOJOURN (4) ______________________

Traveling south from Queenstown to Kingston - Lumsden - Te Anau - Milford Sound - back to Te Anau - South through Manapouri - Tuatapere - Riverton - Nightcaps - Drummond - Gore - Invercargill - Bluff - then North East to the Caitlins (Coastal area between Bluff and Balclutha) - then North to Balcutha - Dunedin - Palmerston - Ranfurly -  Naseby - St Bathans - Alexandra - Clyde - Cromwell - Arrowtown - Ending in Queenstown.

Traveling south to Riverton the road lead out on the coast. To the left is Fouveaux Strait. In the distance is the hinterland of Fiordland.

A somewhat hazy photo of Riverton from a lookout above the town.

The communal kitchen of our digs in Riverton. The Campsite is a converted school outdoor education centre. The commodious kitchen contained a wood fired cooking stove. It was a robust, honest place with a decor that was definitely circa 1950. By the look of the stack of firewood on the veranda the building retained its distinctive 1950s insulation properties as well.

The lounge / dining / living room was the old school hall now equipped with a large fireplace. It was richly furnished in nostalgia including Formica tables and chairs with shiny chromed legs exactly like the set I grew up with in Christchurch in the 1960s.

Various glass fronted display cases had riveting displays of old bottles and other paraphernalia.

I noted the very emancipated advice from a poster in the kitchen.

 

I thought that I had been dreaming but on investigation I found that the whinnying that I had heard all night actually came from this horse in the paddock across the road. This horse paced up and down in front of a small creek that stopped it from gaining higher ground where there were three of its companions. It intermittently stopped in front of the creek and vigourously nodded its head up and down but never took the risk and jumped. I watched and dreamed of saddling it up and with a short haired Border Collie dog, that I would name 'Footrot Flats' style, 'Dog' as a companion, riding off into the great back of beyond back country of New Zealand.

I liked Riverton a lot. It has an air of purpose and authenticity about it. It gets its own steady stream of tourists but not so many that this has changed the essential nature and look of the place - a loss that has been effected by the hordes of tourists in places such as Queenstown.

This small port has an interesting little fishing wharf.  We took a walk along the jetty among the crayfish pots and other fishing gear as one boat was unloading after being at sea for two weeks.

No doubt the builder had good and probably humourous reasons for naming this local yacht with the direct and expressive name 'Pig Iron'...... but the name is somewhat ironic (excuse the pun), because the yacht is built of sheet steel (either run of the mill steel or the more non - corrosive Corten steel) rather than iron which is something different again.

The local museum proudly told its history of both Maori and Pakeha discovery and settlement.

Southlands topiary is probably the best I have ever seen anywhere in the world and by far the most humourous!