Kerikeri

Well, here we are in the Northland staying in a lovely little cottage in a town called Kerikeri. Kerikeri is known for it's mandarin oranges and fruit in general. It's warmer in the Northland so citrus fruit can be grown. Citrus is something I've been missing on our trip. It's nice to now have some of the local variety to eat now.

We went for a short hike at Puketeti Forest yesterday to see the local kauri groves. Here's a link if you want to find out more about this giant of a tree: www.kauri-museum.com

It's been a pretty uneventful stay here. We hoped to have better weather but it's been sort of grey and cloudy for much of the time. In fact, a weeks worth of rain is settling in now which should last the duration of our time in NZ.

On a whim, John and I went to a local folk music club last Friday night. We were walking in town and noticed a poster on a window for a couple of people with banjos and guitars. We both like that sort of music and decided to take in the local color. (More on that later.)

The venue was a local distillary where they make all their own spirits on site. I had a "black" sambuca that wasn't bad and John had a tequilla that was more like moonshine than the smooth tequila from Mexico that we know and love. Ah well...we're in NZ after all.

We settled in to a nice evening of Irish music with Michael Black and John Sanders. Michael Black was the main attraction and he sang the typical Irish songs you would expect. But John Saunders really caught my attention and John's too. He was a really good guitar and other stringed instruments musician and we wanted to hear more of him by the time the concert was over. We purchased a CD and will be sure to learn more about him and his music when we return to the US.

But perhaps the thing that will keep the night special in our minds is what happened after the show. We were seated next to a couple of men who clearly loved to sing and had really good voices, too. Turns out one of the guys is a local artist who does gigs around the area and the other is a life long friend of his who happens to share a common heritage...Croation.

John overheard them talking about their Croation music to some others and struck up a converstaion with them. Erin and Laura had toured Croatia together and loved the country so John was keen to find out more about it from these too affable gentlmen.

When the music was over, one of the men turned to us and invited us to their place for more music and conversation. Now a bit about the "local color" comment above.

John and I had hoped to connect to more Kiwis on our trip here but for various reasons, our journey hasn't given us that opportunity. It's a regret that we both have but perhaps a future trip will be different.

Well, I pretty much jumped on the offer to join them for more music and conversation and John, I think, came along a little begrudgingly. We followed them to the house of one of the men and had a very interesting conversation with them about Croatia, New Zealand and music. The one man, Ivo Yelavich, was the musician and pulled out his guitar, computer and speaker and treated us to a very eclectic concert of music and song that he sings at weddings, funerals, farmer's markets etc. around the area. He particularly loves Country music but he played and sang Croation, Maori, Rock and Roll, and Blue Grass for us that night.

The other man, Jone Yelcich, also had a nice voice and the two of them sang several songs together, too. In between songs were stories of Dalmation (Croatia) immigration in the 1800s and how hard it was to work in the gathering gum from the Kauri trees here in the Northland. Gum was a highly valued commodity then and many workers were employed to process it for use throught the world.

There's so much more tha tcould be added here about the converstion we had about Croatia, immigrants, and Maoris but suffice to say, it was a very interesting evening. We actually didn't get home until almost 1:00am but I'm very glad we met them both and that we were bold enough to take them up on their offer for an evening of music and converstion.

We'll be heading back to Devonport (near Auckland) on Tuesday for our final few days in NZ before flying to Christchurch in the south island to celebrate John's 60th birthday and fly out the next day to Australia for the last leg of our incredible journey.