Open for business

Hi…Just a quick note to confirm that the Chalet is open for business this winter…we had some interest in a long term tenancy on the property but that has fallen through and so we are back to business as usual for the 2011 winter season…looks like it may be a ripper as it’s sure been cold enough…

Things about eggs

Those sneaky chickens have been hiding their eggs!! We found this stash under layers of blackberry in a corner of their run…not being too sure how long they had been laying there (which came first the chicken or the blackberry?) we wanted to check that they were OK to use.

We found this neat little poem to show the four stages of a post-chicken egg…

Can you eat that egg?

If not sure you ought-ter,
then place it in water.
If it lies on its side,
then it’s fresh; eat with pride.

After three or four days,
at an angle it lays.
But, it still is a treat,
so go on and eat.

Ten days, stands on end,
in your baking ’twill blend.
‘Cause it’s definitely edible,
in your baking, incredible.

But, if it floats on the surface,
that egg serves no purpose.
‘Cause a floater’s a stinker!
Out the back door best fling ‘er!

As it turned out, they were all OK and we now know how to select the older eggs that are best for pavlovas…

Cool outlook for the weekend…

…but not necessarily a bad thing for those those doing the Traverse…got the lawns and edges done tonight before the rain arrived…miraculously some of the pitas we planted along the fence have survived both winter and my careless wielding of the weedeater…am back on top of the surrounds again which is really satisfying…most of our new flax seems to have survived as well so I think we’ll slip some more in along the fence lines, as well as more pitas and Horopito peppers…

Pheewwww!!!

It been baking hot over the weekend and today we’re enjoying a mild overcast and hopefully some light rain to keep everything green…

We’ve had quite good occupancy over the holidays…obviously a sign that people are recognising that the Central Plateau is a year-round destination for outdoorsy stuff and just godd old-fashioned veging and recharging the batteries…

So this is Christmas…?

Well, not quite, perhaps, but woke to a flurry of snow this morning…and I see on AA Roadwatch that the Desert Road is closed with snow and ice this morning…the old Mountain giving the ski season one last fling perhaps…?

It’s definitely still winter!!

Just in case anyone was wondering if it was actually spring time and time to start getting some veges into the garden, let me reassure you that it is definitely still winter up here.

It has been raining for over a week but we thought we’d seen the wet worst of the current series of weather systems coming from across the Tasman Sea but a light drizzle this morning turned to snow flakes around 8-30 this morning as I left for work. It was snowing heavily by the time I got to National Park (all of 5km up the road). State Highway 4 was pretty messy from National Park to the SH49 turn-off to Ohakune but drivable with care…pity the guy who crossed the centre line and hit me didn’t take enough care when he hit the brakes…just kept on sliding…still, no one was hurt and we both were able to drive away – which is good as the Hiropito Straights are no place to be stranded in the snow, or most other times…

All this bodes well for a white start to the school holidays up around the Mountain, whether you want to hit the slops or just curl up by the fire with a good book or a movie or ten….

Just when you think…

…you’ve got the weather around this place sussed, it throws another funny at you…it rained all last weekend – good for the water tanks and definitely indoor days unless you were up on the Mountain but we were amazed to wake on monday morning after a night of rain to find a good dusting of snow over the pungas…of course, I was too slow to think of taking some pics, even after seeing the cute as snowman the kids staying in the Chalet had made that morning…