sheepish traffic jam

well, it's official. i am in new zealand! i was on my way to waimarama beach when i got stopped on the road due to newly shorn sheep being herded down the road. just has to put a smile on your face. in other news, for the past week i have been working at the Giants facility of Craggy Range Winery working pumpovers for the merlot fermentations that will be going into their Sophia wine. my pumpover partner, katy (roomie 1), and i have worked out a system so that we can switch cuves as fast as a NASCAR pit crew changes tires. it's a whole different ballgame at Giants because this facility is connected to their Cellar Door and their Terroir Restaurant, which means that we have to be on our best behavior and there is no room for big messes. it also means that sometimes we get interrupted by tours passing through or magazine photo shoots. definitely cuts into your time when you've got more than 20 pumpovers to do in a day!
on the flip side, we miss terribly our other 2 roommates and the rest of the crew that are over at the SH50 facility. we also missed an awesome display of rainbows that were photographed by brittany (roomie 2).
and 1 final photo of my fellow roomies (from left to right, marine, katy, me, michael scorsone visiting from california, and brittany) as we dined at Terroir Restaurant before we got put on separate shifts.

insert creative title here

ahhh...a day off...great after working 7 days of 12+ hour shifts. my feet thank me for not putting on those kiwi work boots and my hands thank me for not having to wrap themselves around 2” hoses. and yes, graham, a 2” hose is no longer my nemesis. i’ve upgraded to the 3” hose, especially when full of juice and with a big honkin’ ball valve that weighs about 10kg on one end. so we started receiving contract grapes from delegates wine estate, which has been great for me to hone my cellar skills before we get going on the big guns or craggy fruit. i must remember in the future to be very wary of a winery that has a contract crush because that delegates fruit has been the source of many frustrations. and just when we thought they were done, they come back to inform us that they “found” about 200 tons of fruit...yep, you heard me right. well at least i get some giggles in whenever those kiwis walk or ride by with their short shorts on!

i’ve also moved into the girls vintage house as we like to call it. it’s a quirky house but with a sweet garden filled with chard, rocket, mint, basil, scallions, lemons, and feijoas (the best fruit in the world according to most kiwis). i’m living with the aforementioned french girl, Marine, and with 2 californians (Katy and Brittany) that graduated from cal poly. it’s been awesome working with those 2 because i’m definitely learning a lot from them.

there’s really not much else to add because all i’ve been doing is working, working, and more working. i believe it’ll get much more exciting in terms of learning and actually seeing awesome fruit now that we’ll be starting to harvest craggy grapes. oh yeah, a note about the top photo. we got a storm front that came in and dropped buckets of rain on us. but before that happened, i was on the outside catwalk taking a dip (volume measurement) of the 80,000L tank when i looked up and saw this sweet view, complete with a hot air balloon in the distance. even though i was wicked tired, it brought a grin to my face because let’s face it, i’m working vintage in new zealand!

let's get ready to rrrrrrumble...in the scrum of vintage!

i had one last weekend until harvest begins next week, so this is a quick entry because i had to share my adventure to climb the longest place name in the world, which happens to be near Porangahau on the coast of the southern part of Central Hawke's Bay. you can see the name in the photo...85 letters...or Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu. it tells the story of the great maori warrior who has big knees and eats mountains who blew his flute at the top of this hill for his brother.

anyway, if you can ever climb it (not too bad at about 2 hours roundtrip), do it! the path is on private property so you have to go to the Duke of Edinburgh hotel in Porangahau and ask if they can call up Airlie Scott (i think that's how you spell his name) and get permission to go on his land. then you just buy him a couple of beers and drive on over. you'll have to also find his unmarked house (by the bridge). the trail is just on grazing land, so there are no markers per se except for some green arrows spraypainted onto the metal fences keeping the sheep in line. but once you get to the top, the view is spectacular! i guess it's a circuitous route so that you can keep walking and go down through someone else's private property. we tried and found the bench to be used in order to climb over the barbed wire fence (see photo below...that's my new roommate Marine from Toulouse), but there was definitely no trail markers so we just went down the same way since we had a party to make that night.

marmite vs. vegemite

first off, i want to thank EVERYONE who wished me a happy birthday! you guys are way too sweet to remember. funny thing is that i had 2 birthdays since new zealand is a day ahead of the states and europe :) another funny thing is that i thought it would be a lonely birthday, but luckily harvest has yet to fully start (which does suck because of all the !@#% cleaning i've been doing) and, best of all, the cool cats at craggy range organized a surprise dinner party for me!! but that's not the best part...the best part is that i didn't even realize it was supposed to be a surprise because we had already talked about getting together to get drinks. when i arrived and saw everyone, i just thought that i was late. i also caught their lookouts off guard since i came in a different way. i guess since i totally didn't expect it, i was so surprised that i wasn't surprised. (sorry i stuck that last sentence in to see how many times i could use "surprise")

so, as you can see above, new zealand is unbelievably beautiful. i went to the top of Te Mata peak, which you can see from my cottage, in order to get the best view of Hawke's Bay. the great thing is that you can actually see the landmark winery for Craggy Range (they have another one where all the gritty stuff gets done 30 minutes away), which makes for a great view if you go paragliding. i would love to paraglide into work one day...i'll have to look into that. the other photo is a black pebble beach that i stumbled upon when i was sightseeing in Napier. i just took a moment to breathe in and daydream. but if that doesn't make you love new zealand, well they've got bikers too (see below) and these bikers shoot themselves like they do in america! they also like to make fun of the French (tres desoles, mesdames et messieurs).
well, work has been work. Craggy is awesome with an awesome staff. it is the biggest winery i've worked at so it's been interesting trying to get in the groove of large-scale as well as getting over slight vertigo as i learn to climb barrel stacks and walk on catwalks. they are also super into cleaning (note to you davis kids)...a helluva lot more than in france! the joy of all this barrel washing i've been doing is that i get to use the most phallic looking barrel washers, which is made all the more funny when they were telling me how to use it by going down the middle of the barrel to find the (bung)hole. i know, i know, very childish of me to giggle but it was quite funny. i have yet to jump into a touch rugby game because i've got to learn their spiral throw first and they're a bit competitive (there have already been a rash of injuries and scrapes). but the last fun thing at work is that i had the chance to drive a stickshift pick-up to get diesel fuel...and without my stickshift mentor jenn by my side! jenn you would have been so proud of me. there was only 30 minutes 'til the end of shift so i was tempted to let this task go (also because i was afraid to spill diesel fuel everywhere and all over me) but i shook it off and did it. silly thing to be proud of, i know, but i was very proud of myself that day.

besides work, i've done very little sightseeing (maybe because i've had sightseeing overload). i did drive to lake taupo and to the volcanoes (where they filmed mordor scenes for lord of the rings...the photo with half of a volcano showing was the stand-in for mt. doom). but as you can see below, it's still gorgeous! i even went up the chairlift to get a view of a potential skiing area if i end up having time at the end of my stay. skiing on an active volcano that is predicted to go off in a month or so...priceless...

p.s. i'll let you know who wins the concentrated salty yeast extract battle

home on the craggy range

so i've made it to new zealand!!!

it is an absolutely amazing winery!! it appears exactly as it looks on the website. and i must say, my accomodations are delightfully lovely and un-hostel-like. i'm staying at the woodlands cottage (pictured below, along with a view from the cottage...don't be jealous ;). it's great place, just a bit of a sandfly and little ant problem, but nothing too major. i'm there alone now but there will be a french girl moving in next week. everyone is super nice here and i even got a car (sadly, or not too sadly, not a stickshift). there's not too much to report now as i haven't really started working yet. i met up with the crew at the SH50 winery (the winery seen on the website and above is the Giants winery) and i did some berry sampling today. as they say, it's the calm before the storm. i'll try to update you again before the storm really starts brewing, otherwise you may not hear from me for a bit! if anyone wants to send me any kind of mail, please send it to...

MJ Tsay

Craggy Range Winery

Woodlands Cottage

253 Waimarama Road

P.O. Box 8749

Havelock North 4230

Hawkes Bay, New Zealand

are you my mommy, mr. human beatbox machine?

sorry, it's been awhile since i've updated this blog, but reliable and fast internet connection is hard to come by when you're traveling on the fly in hostels.

our grand campervan roadtrip ended up in cairns without a cyclone in sight. it was bloody humid up there though...upper 30 degree celsius weather with 90% humidity will do you good. jenn and i just took a nap in the shade of a banyan tree for a few hours in cairns before we tried to see any part of the city...which there wasn't much to see or at least much interesting to see when you feel like you're swimming through the sizzling heat.

so we bid adieu to our campervan beethoven and flew down to melbourne. melbourne is a pretty wicked city with all the great food and kickin' music scene. i daresay that if you had to choose one city to go to in australia, i would recommend melbourne over sydney. we continued on our wild australia tour by seeing more wildlife in the form of the littlest penguins in the world. i even had a close encounter with a baby fairy penguin down on st. kilda pier that chased me and nibbled at my ankles. this happened while we were waiting for the one concert we got to see in australia for a decent price...a concert given by the one and only Rahzel! i don't know if you've heard of him or not, but i managed to unknowingly catch him in a concert during armadillo day at northwestern university back in '98. he is amazing now as he was then. i took some video (sadly my battery ran out), but it doesn't matter because video does not do justice to how deep he can get his voice to go and just how awesome he is. if you ever get a chance to see him live, DO IT!!!

we then headed to the hallowed melbourne cricket ground to get up close and personal with this baffling sport. we even caught a friendly match between the politicians of victoria. i'm glad they are hard at work. it's an intriguing sport. i hear even the aussies and kiwis don't even know all the rules. i'm going to try to find this new book called "How to Catch a Cricket Match" by Harry Ricketts (sounds like a cricket athlete name too, huh?) which is supposed to be filled with "interesting" anecdotes and some explanations on the game. world cup cricket is around the corner and i've got to be able to follow the conversations of the day!

we then headed to adelaide for a quick trip. pretty much all aussies say that adelaide is filled with religion and churches, which is true, but there's actually a lot more. for starters, the art gallery is free, air conditioned, and has a bag check so you can spend hours soaking up the art and the cool air. (no, i'm not a wimp, it got to 40 degrees C in melbourne and high 30s in adelaide.) besides that, there's also (for all you davis people) james erskine and, surprise, christian antony in adelaide! christian is here for harvest and has a sweet set-up with very nice argentinian roommates. it was great to have some beers with him again. sadly, i didn't see much of james except for 5 minutes, i'll make sure he never forgets that...hahah just kidding.

i did finally do some wine sight-seeing in barossa valley...no winery tours, just tasting rooms. driving to barossa is a bit like driving on the back roads to napa from davis and barossa was great. we managed to stop in at torbreck, penfolds (of course but the tasting man was really nice), rockford (they've got a great alicante bouschet), and two hands (my favorite of the day). i wasn't much of a syrah drinker before, but i softened up to it after tasting australian syrah. it's not as peppery, smokey, in-your-face as it can be in california.

this is a sand island...there are no rocks, mate!

first off, i must pat myself on the back for learning to drive a stickshift in australia...thank you very much for all those doubters out there. and on the other side of the road! i can't wait to practice stickshifting when i get back to america :) i still have to master hills and traffic jams though. second of all, i also tried surfing for the first time ever and managed to stand up and ride out some small waves!

in any case, jenn and i took a day-tour to Fraser Island, australia's largest sand island. it was a great tour, especially the beach highways and crystal-clear Lake Mackenzie. but best of all, we got to share the day with a ditzy family, one of whom we dubbed George of the Jungle. a crack-up bunch these people were. at one point, George was throwing some pinecones onto the roof of the bathroom and stated that he wanted to do the same with some rocks if he could find some. our very patient tour guide promptly answered, "this is a sand island...there are no rocks, mate!" and that was just one of many hilarities on this trip, including the photo below where George volunteered to enter the dingo cage, similar to the bear chest when you go camping in america.














we then continued north, despite the above ditzy family trying to scare us with news of
monsoon/cylcone-like weather further north, stopping in Rockhampton (known for its beef and how so since we got 2 sirloin steaks for $5AUD) and Mackay (after watching a platypus in Eungella) before we made it to Airlie Beach (the take-off point for the Whitsunday Islands). well, jenn and i decided to splurge on some real vacation time by booking 3 nights at a hotel on Hamilton Island and a day-trip to snorkel at the Great Barrier Reef. it's been totally worth it now that the humidity has set in which has made for some hot nights in our campervan. and what do you know, we've enjoyed sunny skies pretty much everyday!

finally, in continuing with the idea of free campervan parking...

7. Rockhampton carpark by the Esplanade - just be careful of the mysterious crapping trees
8. Mackay Town Beach - but can be quite buggy.

p.s. these may not be satisfying photos so i'll promise to post more when i get jenn's photos.