"Well done, Nanny" [composed 22ish November 2010]

I haven't updated in a while because I have actually been staying in one place (for the time being anyway)! Instead of bouncing from one adventure to the next, I hopped off my tour bus at a Honey Shop on the major highway heading south, right smack dab in the middle of farm country. I am staying with one of the only contacts I knew in New Zealand before I set off on my journey: my sister's "Scottish sister." How does that work? Well, I'm not sure what else to call her, but my sister spent 6 months living with Meg and her family in Scotland while they were in high school. Now Meg lives in the outskirts of Palmerston North with her husband and four kids on a dairy farm, and she invited me to stop in for "as long as I would like." Little did she know I would actually take her up on this offer and stay for just short of three weeks!

The accommodation is lovely: a flat to myself with a huge bed, plenty of room for my nightly yoga, way more couches and overstuffed chairs than I would ever need, my own bathroom (or "toilet" as they're called over here), and even a little kitchenette (as if I would ever need to use it with all the food provided in the main house!) The flat is separate from the house, both of which are nestled at the end of a long gravel driveway. Outside my window is the paddock that belongs to Misty, the pony, and behind that is the chook house. In just about every direction, there are various paddocks occupied by Jersey (brown) cows, that are rotated around depending on the day or time. The driveway branches off to loop around the house and the rest turns into the "track" that leads up the family farm to the cow shed, where the milking takes place.