April 2017 Each year the autumn season starts, and the first Amanita pop out of the ground, are they real, a sculpture, or some pipe dream..........  but maybe not the same can be said of the local “human” infrastructure” that can get a bit flaky in unpredictable ways with council claims of we are doing our best. We know rain often results in slippy hillsides and blocked roads which = quieter times here at Mahara, really quiet times this year for most of April as it turns out, along with telephone lines being ripped out by the river, power on and off and we were treated to a “big one” on the road in.  After the local road up the valley was sorted then it was the Thames Coast Road out and ongoing.  So it started with just down the road a little and a week later they were still doing this as the hill still kept a sliding -
Reliable
The next significant happening was possibly the completion of the sculpture so long in the making, it just works and thus was accorded a full score of Brownie Points and smiles all round. .
......followed by a fine Mahara day in such contrast to that before.
Then next day the sculpture gets mounted in the garden
It ties in the whole “Fence Post Gallery” area, acting as a focal point for all the galleries sculptures and it comes across as rather stunning especially in the way it works with it’s neighbouring sculptures. For a wider perspective here is a view of the gallery as it currently stands.
The road is somewhere under the the digger for the third time....... and then in the next photo if you look carefully that is a helicopter with a monsoon bucket hovering above the creek. They were trying to sluice more hanging rubble down. They only tried the once for water from the river, too dangerous in the confined space.
The effort to keep the place looking trim and tidy, Heathers focus, has now got a lot easier despite being such a tree orientated zone.  The amount of effort controlling leaf drop has now met it’s match in the form of a BIG backpack leaf blower, a Stihl.  The decision wasn’t without it’s soul searching and associated discussions as it did not fit in the budget, but Boy oh Boy! it IS good and very much a time saver.  Finally a way of also keeping the entrance and driveway looking good as comments have proved. In Labyrinth News the hedges have been badly hit with a fungus so there is an intensive spray program to control that.  Ultimately we will have to find a replacement plant species probably an NZ hedging of some sort, money to be found, it’s all something we could have done without but as Heathers labyrinth is such a core feature it will be done! Towards the end of the month Heather took off to Wellington to commune with family and friends thus I was left to fend for myself and............ well get stuff done :-) So amongst other things I finished creating some steps down the Kauri Pond path, done to help finish the area off and to control the run off in heavy rain thus diminishing the job of path repair.  The initial plan had been to only put a few in here and there with subsequent progress overseen and approval given by....... H.  Of course to get it “right” ie job gets bigger, more had to be added, drainage put in, edging to stop the blackbirds rifling through the leaf litter and covering the path but done it was..... and then I counted them, came out to 13, nah! can’t have that, another was needed but where?? and the stone from where??  Talk about over thinking things but when you add the digits 1 and 4 (as in 14 steps) you get 5....... but I like 6 better and thus is was and is for a long time to come, stone was found, gravel skimmed from other places, all done.
Probably in the next posting we will cover some of Heather’s latest outdoor sculptural creations, there are enough for a feature in themselves, with as of today, still one to be finished.  They be looking good and will certainly advance the army of sculptures to be seen at Mahara Sculpture Park. It has rained most of the night so soon I get to see if the steps have done their job and adjust accordingly if not. ........and as a final offering we share with you why we are doing so much to support the local frog population.  This cool dude, a garden ornament with a side interest in passing flies, quite at home on the vege garden fence and seeming not bothered with having a camera lens in it’s face.
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April 2017 Each year the autumn season starts, and the first Amanita pop out of the ground, are they real, a sculpture, or some pipe dream..........  but maybe not the same can be said of the local “human” infrastructure” that can get a bit flaky in unpredictable ways with council claims of we are doing our best. We know rain often results in slippy hillsides and blocked roads which = quieter times here at Mahara, really quiet times this year for most of April as it turns out, along with telephone lines being ripped out by the river, power on and off and we were treated to a “big one” on the road in.  After the local road up the valley was sorted then it was the Thames Coast Road out and ongoing.  So it started with just down the road a little and a week later they were still doing this as the hill still kept a sliding -
The road is somewhere under the the digger for the third time....... and then in the next photo if you look carefully that is a helicopter with a monsoon bucket hovering above the creek. They were trying to sluice more hanging rubble down. They only tried the once for water from the river, too dangerous in the confined space.
The next significant happening was possibly the completion of the sculpture so long in the making, it just works and thus was accorded a full score of Brownie Points and smiles all round.
......followed by a fine Mahara day in such contrast to that before.
Then next day the sculpture gets mounted in the garden
Reliable
It ties in the whole “Fence Post Gallery” area, acting as a focal point for all the galleries sculptures and it comes across as rather stunning especially in the way it works with it’s neighbouring sculptures. For a wider perspective here is a view of the gallery as it currently stands.
The effort to keep the place looking trim and tidy, Heathers focus, has now got a lot easier despite being such a tree orientated zone.  The amount of effort controlling leaf drop has now met it’s match in the form of a BIG backpack leaf blower, a Stihl.  The decision wasn’t without it’s soul searching and associated discussions as it did not fit in the budget, but Boy oh Boy! it IS good and very much a time saver.  Finally a way of also keeping the entrance and driveway looking good as comments have proved. In Labyrinth News the hedges have been badly hit with a fungus so there is an intensive spray program to control that.  Ultimately we will have to find a replacement plant species probably an NZ hedging of some sort, money to be found, it’s all something we could have done without but as Heathers labyrinth is such a core feature it will be done! Towards the end of the month Heather took off to Wellington to commune with family and friends thus I was left to fend for myself and............ well get stuff done :-) So amongst other things I finished creating some steps down the Kauri Pond path, done to help finish the area off and to control the run off in heavy rain thus diminishing the job of path repair.  The initial plan had been to only put a few in here and there with subsequent progress overseen and approval given by....... H.  Of course to get it “right” ie job gets bigger, more had to be added, drainage put in, edging to stop the blackbirds rifling through the leaf litter and covering the path but done it was..... and then I counted them, came out to 13, nah! can’t have that, another was needed but where?? and the stone from where??  Talk about over thinking things but when you add the digits 1 and 4 (as in 14 steps) you get 5....... but I like 6 better and thus is was and is for a long time to come, stone was found, gravel skimmed from other places, all done.
Probably in the next posting we will cover some of Heather’s latest outdoor sculptural creations, there are enough for a feature in themselves, with as of today, still one to be finished.  They be looking good and will certainly advance the army of sculptures to be seen at Mahara Sculpture Park. It has rained most of the night so soon I get to see if the steps have done their job and adjust accordingly if not. ........and as a final offering we share with you why we are doing so much to support the local frog population.  This cool dude, a garden ornament with a side interest in passing flies, quite at home on the vege garden fence and seeming not bothered with having a camera lens in it’s face.