Henriette

This beautifully restored 103 year old steam engine was shown and talked about at the Duart House historic talk last week.  It worked in New Zealand for fifty years before being abandoned in a paddock near Fielding.  It was rescued and restored and has spent its next fifty years as a show piece at events and steam engine rallies.

Gardens at Duart House

Duart House is a wonderful historic building in Havelock North with lovely gardens.  These grape leaves are at their best right now while this group of trees always looks magnificent.

Southern Hemisphere Autumn

In the Southern Hemisphere it is now autumn and I cannot resist posting a couple of photographs taken in my garden.  The top picture is of some dogwood leaves - the lower picture is of my persimmon tree as the colour starts to change.  Nothing like the colours I saw in Vermont in 2010 but lovely for all that.

Interesting Things That Happen

This pile of ash is from the rubbish burned after a long fire ban was lifted.  We used to use rubbish ash like this when we were making ash glazes as the mixed materials always gave us different colours.  The other day this small plane lost its nose wheel and ended up on its nose on the runway behind my property.