Nelson

Greetings...
I've resurfaced from the sounds. I had a relaxing and entertaining time at Hopewell and met a lot of fun people. It was time to move on to other things though- as I don't have much to spare, so I traveled out to Nelson on Thursday with some German's in their van (doesn't seem to be a shortage of those over here... German's... or vans). They dropped me off in the heart of Nelson and I found Susie Lees who I'd set up to WWOOF with. She works at a woman's fiber cooperative in town once a week and as you can imagine I was in heaven. Lots of knitting and felted fiber works... From wool, as well as llama and alpaca and opossum... did you know that opossum is the only other creature that has fur like the polar bear- which has a hollow core, thus being very warm? Well, supposedly it does, and since opossums were introduced to NZ from Australia and are considered a pest... well, it makes great warm fiber wears. (just a side note)
I headed out to the farm later that day with Susie just in time to help milk the goats with Amory (another WWOOFER who has been there for a bit). They are great, plus there is a baby goat named chalky bounding and kicking all over the place. So cute! Susie and her partner Kev make (and sell on the side) goat cheese as well. I haven't yet been involved in that full on process, but I plan to. They do feta, ricotta as well as some hard cheeses, and even have a blue in the works... 2 months so far. Simply fascinating! I think it's the perfect place for me.
Friday we all worked hard (there are also 2 other German wwoofers there.. surprise!) harvesting and prepping the veggies for the Sat market. I went in with Susie before sunrise (beautiful!) and helped her set up her stall. Then I was on my own for a bit to check out the market. Again- it was heaven for me!
Later that morning her friend Betty Rae showed up (a woman I'd met at the fabric coop) and I have been with her the last few days learning how to felt. She has a few llama's and alpaca's of her own and makes all these great things. So they've swapped wwoofers for a night and here I am. I will head back to the farm tomorrow afternoon. The bag I've been working on I've named Rufus after the alpaca who so generously shared his fur with me. I'd attach more photos, but these computers take so dang long to download them.
Betty is a character who left her 35 yr bad marriage a few years ago, bought a bus and spent 3 years traveling the south island on it. She has finally settled down and bought a house in town (due to her daughter's encouraging) and now has animals and a craft room. She also takes in boarders who are studying English at the school in town. There is a Swiss girl with her now. Yesterday the 3 of us wandered into town to watch the annual Trolley Derby. Basically they block off the street with the biggest hill and kids of all ages build go-cars and race them down the street. It was a hoot! There was a dj (so I got to witness the cars whizzing by to a soundtrack of Eye of the Tiger (go LVHS!!) and free popsicles for everyone! Hilarious to see what kids come up with!
The last few days here have been FINE indeed (that incidentally is the way they describe a "good weather forecast". ie- it will be rainy in the morning with strong south easterlies, turning fine in the afternoon.
On that note- I think I'll wrap it up for today. I plan to head elsewhere around Friday or Saturday, so stay tuned.
Take it easy kids,
lovejen