Day 3 some are flaking

Great news - some of our younger members met the coaches of the Zimbabwe Test team last night - there is an NZ/Zim Test in Napier - which led to them being rather late back to the hotel. Finding it locked, they decided, in good Norfolk manner, to enter via the fire escape. The hotel is charming, a model of Art Deco style built in the late 1930s - and rather confusing in its layout, especially, it appears, if approached by the fire escape, They got up to the first floor, but had no idea where they or their rooms were; at this point they made a desperate and ill-fated decision, and choosing a room at random, entered via the window. Very, very luckily for them, the occupant was at least one of our group. She was however very much less than amused, but it could have been worse and a potential international incident was thus narrowly avoided. What the said occupant did point out to these inefficient burglars was that the room keys in their pockets would also have opened the outside door of the hotel! Onward today to sale yards and onto a real farm, that of the President of Federated Farmers. We first saw him sell some draft 5-year old ewes for about the top price of the market - about £83/head. Our own resident expert reckoned sheep prices were similar to those at home; however the locals are pretty pleased, since they are nearly double prices last year when no-one had any keep. We then had the pleasure of seeing something, through the rain and low cloud, of his home property and discussing the agricultural scene in NZ further. One of the startling revelations was to hear that in the 1960s his father and uncle had cleared about 2,000 acres of bush by hand, with the eventual help of a bulldozer and some chain saws but initially without those - over a period of 20 years! I thought that was something that had happened in the 1860s, not in my lifetime. The result is amazing - a property with a bout 3,500 ewes plus replacements and 800 cattle. Currently it is up cattle and down sheep, but Kiwis react quickly to market signals. His cattle looked magnificent. Our discussions ranged over international finance and the influence of the Chinese to how such a farm might be developed in the future to make space for the next, (third) generation - familiar (apart from the Chinese) and in many ways shared problems between our group and our friendly and welcoming hosts. Richard Rampton NRBAS Easton College