Forst thing monday morning we were picked up at the volunteer house by Dave, our group leader and taken to the volunteer office in Ponsonby to pick up the new starters. Dave turned out to be the best leader we had in our time with CVNZ, he was a kiwi aged around 50 and had lived in Australia working for CVA for about 25 years. He was a lot more laid back than Bruce, but led by example when we were working durin the day.
This week our group was really small and a bit quiter but we all got on really well. as a result we worked hard during the day and had a bit of fun playing cards and watching TV in the evenings. We were based at a cosy little rangers lodge in a small rural village. The Hunua ranges area vast expanse of coutryside encoperating forests, farmland, mountains, beaches and waterfalls. The landscae is similar to somewhere like the peak district back in the UK.
On arrival on Monday lunchtime we dumped our kit and headed up one of the bush tracks clearing out about a 5km stretch of drainage using forks and spades. This gave us a chance to get used to the landscape of the area we would be working in. Althought the work was quite tough, the native bush was beautiful and Dave taught us lots about the native flora and fauna. We also got the chance to see the stunning Hunua Falls - a waterfall of about 14m in height.
We spent most of Tuesday tramping through the wild bush trying to locate existing Possum traps or 'bait staions'. On thing we learned quite quickly is that in New Zealand the only native mammal is one species of Bat - all other mammals on the island are therefore considered to be pests as they endanger the bird population. Possums we brought over from Australia in the past and are now reaking havoc with the native bird and tree species. On Wednesday we continued to located possum traps and make sure they were secured and in the correct place to effectively kill possums by feeding them a type of poison.
In the evenings we took it in turn to cook - Katie and I made a chicken casserole followed by a apple and fijoa crumble which went down a treat. We also introduced the group to 'Pass the Pigs' and we played cards in front of a blisteringly hot log fire. It was really nice to come home to a warm cosy house rather than being at the cold and wet camp!
On Thursday we headed out to the coast to a place called Duder - a section of the park which was run by a scottish ranger called Maggs. The weather wasn't too great at the start of the day so she had us clearing out a woolshed used by farmer to shear sheep and store wool. This was a dirty but interesting job...Kate helped clear out the kitchen quarters which were full of rat droppings and cockroaches! In the afternoon we dug out a new section of footpath and helped retore a section of fencing that had been trampled down by some cattle.
On Friday we headed back to Auckland for the weekend after an enjoyable week with Dave and the rest of the group.
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