Milk, the Other White Meat

This was the best unplanned stop of the trip.

Kai and Mia preparing for a ride on the 4-wheeler

Jen:  The hospitality of the Kiwi's is unparalleled in our book, due mainly to Greg.  Greg is the gregarious dairy farmer we met at a holiday park, earlier in our trip.  We decided to take him up on his offer to see the farm and rang him up. 

View from the farmhouse

He seemed delighted to host us still, and told us to come look for him, if he wasn't in the house when we arrived.  It sounded like a simple instruction until we pulled up to his place.  It was a rambling home set up on a vista, overlooking acres of green rolling hills.  There were shades of green I've never seen before.  Greg wasn't home.  Rob and I stared at each other, unsure where to find him, as it appeared he could be anywhere in a five mile radius of farmland. 

#132 and friends

Rob:  Well, it being a dairy farm we decided to start off to look for the cows.  After climbing the first hill we came across the first "herd".  200...300 pregnant cows standing around, loudly chewing the grass, staring at us.  They were as confused as us.  Kai asked if they had names, which was a great question but upon further inspection, each cow had a number tagged to its ear, so I introduced him to #132.

View of his farm and native bush

In the distance we saw what looked like a potential milking station so we started trekking towards it in our flip flops.  Now mind you, this farm is huge, 600 acres of rolling hills and trees.  Suddenly, in the distance we saw a puff of dirt and someone was on a 4 wheeler heading towards us, hopefully Greg, if not we might be in trouble.  With a big grin Greg pulled up and greeted us like we were family.  He insisted that we stay for tea (tea = happy hour), dinner, and the night and gave us the full tour of farm.  500 heads of cow, 600+ acres, 60 acres of preserved native bush, and the family compound, it was amazing place.  His family had farmed it for generations.  

Mia on the 4-wheeler with the whole valley behind her

Front row seats

Of course he had beautiful steaks out for dinner (his own farm raised beef, naturally)  accompanied by his partner Rebecca's famous twice baked potatoes.  Rebecca had kids the same age as ours, and our kids disappeared immediately to play with their new friends.  The whole experience was incredible, not to mention their hospitality.  It was our one true night of "freedom camping," in Greg's driveway.

With sad farewells, it was time to get Rob to the ocean in search of that perfect wave at Raglan, which happened to only be 1/2 hour away.......O by the way there are no predators in NZ, let alone poisonous snakes or bugs.  The only thing that bites are sand flea's and mosquitos.........no tigers, lions, bears, mountain lions, t rex..........what a great place.