Napier, the details (second half)

Aight, so here's the second half of my Napier stay: Well, this observation is actually throughout my Napier stay,... but I have never been offered so many jobs in my life! They are a big fruit-picking area and apples were just coming into season and EVERYONE, even the lady who pumped my gas(!) was offering me jobs, or contacts for fruitpicking jobs. I was heading down to visit with Anne, though, so I turned them down - afterall, Anne is much more exciting than a job picking fruit!

On Wednesday, I hiked out along the beach south of Napier to the Cape Kidnappers Gannet colony. Gannets are a type of seabirds who make a funny (aaa-aaa-aaa) call and who smell like, well, for those of you guys who have been to dook/spirit island, you know the smell. For the rest of you, just imagine what a colony of birds might smell like when they've all been pooping in the same place for the entire spring and summer (remember, its getting toward the end of summer here). This was definitely one of my favorite parts of my stay though. I didn't get too much time with the Gannets since I had to walk with the tides (some areas of the beach are unpassable during high tide). I would have liked a little more, because despite the smell, they were awfully cool to watch, and the view of Cape Kidnappers was great. I will post pictures of this once again when I find a computer with XP (wouldn't that be cool if they were playing 'The Sign' again too??). The beach walk was worth it in and of itself, however, even without the Gannets. It was lovely walking along in the sand, across all sorts of stones and pebbles, sculpted in fascinating shapes by the water. The beach was edged by high cliffs (they must have been 100 meters tall!), which is the reason that parts are unpassable at high tide. Every once in a while, there would be a canyon carved out of the cliffs and I could see inland a bit. There were large boulders out off the coast, which the birds liked to perch on and look particularly scenic. Watching the sea shells and polished pebbles at my feet never ceased to entrance me as well. It was a 2 hour walk out to the colony and another 2 hours back, but, ahhhh, did it feel good! And I have a funny story to tell you about what happened to me when I got to the end. I'll put that in a separate posting.

The last thing: remember my farmyard cacophany on Waiheke Island? The rousing chorus from 2-5 in the morning? (Literally rousing, that is!!) Well, here is another fun, similar experience. For some reason, Napier decided to run their freight trains along the oceanfront instead of putting housese there (go figure - I haven't). Well, the hostel where I was camping was smack up against the railroad tracks. And these tracks are not seldom used! I woke up several times each night as the ground beneath me shook with the passing trains. I just had to laugh and vow to think of it as a free massaging bed - not every hostel can offer that!