A while back, when I was making cheese at home, somehow I got connected to a few cheese enthusiasts and/or professionals via Twitter. They all came from various places, but most of them are based in New Zealand. Hmm how quaint… I knew we’d be visiting this fine country in a few months.

When Justin and I arrived in Auckland, we had no plans and made zero research on what to do. We had the vague idea we wanted to see the scenery and the other vague idea of checking out the cheesemaking scene.

Arriving in the southern part of the North Island, we were headed to a “holiday park” (fancy campground) in Petone, a few minutes away from Wellington. Hmm, Petone… that name was familiar. I remembered that I was following the tweets of a cheese shop owner who also made some cheese herself and taught some classes locally… in Petone! We randomly turned down a street looking for the holiday park and I said to Justin: “I betcha that cheese shop is on this street”. A couple of blocks later, bam! We drove by it! Incredible. I immediately sent a message to Wendy telling her we would come by the shop to visit.

And so today, we went to meet Wendy in her lovely cheese shop named Cultured. We were welcomed with her smile and warm personality as well as with delicious coffee (uhhh was it a “flat white”? I still can’t remember) along with a taste of the Lyttelton Blue and Gaal Chèvre accompanied with some sumptuous dessert olives… what a treat! We chatted about cheese, traveling, the container ship ride and wwoofing.

Delicious and beautiful flat white coffee… I think.

An hour and a half later we were sent home with an Over The Moon washed rind Galactic Gold, an O.M.G. Triple Creme Brie and also got a piece of Kingsmead’s OpakiManchego and Wendy’s famous Tiramisu made with homemade Mascarpone. Guess what was for dinner tonight?

Wendy’s cheese case.

We had a wonderful time and left with the thought that this encounter would not have happened without the internet, reminding one not to underestimate the serendipitous value of social media.

Wendy and Stephanie… bringing the virtual ties to real life.

We’re finally on the road! And driving on the left side! Friday we made it to Rotorua (south-eat of Auckland), which is highly active with geo-thermal fun and Maori culture central.

Yesterday we took a tour of Te Puia, which included the nifty Pohutu geyser:

Surprisingly, the geyser would spit for 2 hours at a time! Although it wasn’t as high as Old Faithful in Yellowstone, it did put it to shame in stamina.

It is hard to believe we’ve disembarked the Cap Cleveland a week ago. It took us a couple of days to get our land legs (we did feel slight swaying in bed and in the shower… go figure) and a couple more to orient ourselves.

So far, we’ve walked around Auckland, took a day trip to Rangitoto Island and hiked to the top of the dormant volcano for great views of the city and the surrounding islands. We were then invited to an afternoon party thrown by very lively recent ex-pats and were driven around by our kiwi host to see some of the beautiful beaches in the greater Auckland area.

Piha beach

Having had only a taste of life in New Zealand, here are a few things we’ve noticed:

* Auckland is very clean (no “rubbish” laying around or any homeless people that we could find)
* There are “heaps” of street signs for pedestrians (with information like how long it will take you to get somewhere)
* Auckland has a lot of parks and trees along the streets
* There are a LOT of bars… many of which are Irish
* There are a LOT of backpackers (both the people and the places)
* People are super friendly, welcoming and will invite you in their lives without second thought
* People dress up. There are a lot of high heels walking around. Women are as or more fashionable as Europeans. A casual mid-week dinner in a small corner Italian restaurant may involve a black dress, lacy tights and designer shoes.
* Lots of “campers” are to be rented. People seem to love traveling in these vans which typically have at least a double bed in the back and sometimes a little sink and stove.
* Internet comes rarely free and when you get connected, it’s bandwidth constricted. We really do take it for granted in the US…
* Post offices (or Post Shops) are really pleasant. They sell magazines and postcards, they have tables with cushy stools where you can sit and prepare your packages, everything is colorful, the employees are young, hip and smart. Note to American (and French) post offices: get your “arse” down here and learn!
* Drivers are pretty courteous, rarely honk, rarely tailgate, everything seems to run smoothly.
* The countryside (or “bush”) looks – at our utmost surprise – very much like Northern California. At least in the surroundings of Auckland. Just replace a few cows with sheep and add a few Punga trees in the middle of the clumps of trees on the hills. I’m sure there are many more differences, but at a glance, we feel pretty at home.
* It’s pretty darn cold in spring… well, what else was I expecting? Duh.

Of course these observations are based on a very short time being here and not having moved around much yet. We’re excited to explore the country a little more and discover some of NZ’s pristine scenery. That means we will need to drive on the wrong left side of the road. Dun dun dun.

I can’t believe this is our last (real) day on board of the Cap Cleveland. We will arrive alongside the Auckland docks late tonight so we’ll sleep on the ship, take care of customs tomorrow morning and set foot on Kiwi land for the first time.

This container ship voyage is the best idea we could possibly have come up with to give us a head start on our longer journey. We feel completely relaxed, we are rested, we are not jet-lagged at all, and we had a wonderful time with the crew, even including making a fool of ourselves singing karaoke. I can’t think of a better way to enter the next phase of our lives.

A little leap of joy… feeling light and rejuvenated.

Bye bye Cap Cleveland. We really, truly had a wonderful time.
Thank you!

We have been blessed with an amazing chief cook (or “cooky”) on this voyage named Danilo. He makes everything from scratch, has a wide repertoire and makes us all unable to shed the least pound (to the captain’s despair) because his food is so yummy.

“Top Chef” Danilo with his intrepid afternoon cooking team.

Danilo has become a great friend and he let us use his kitchen to make some Gougères (cheese puffs). The entire crew knew we would be making “something” for them at 1pm and they were pretty excited.

The pressure was on. We then worked hard at stirring the dough…

… and carefully spooning the paste onto the baking pan under the attentive eye of the chief cook, when…

… I got held up by a ninja who wanted all my gougères! Ahhh!

Too bad, Jeoffrey, I recognized your eyeballs even under your very impressive mask. No gougères for you! Bah, not true… he was the first one to try them.

And here they are fresh out of the oven. They turned out really good, except we forgot we were dealing with real seamen and made them too small. They were half-bite-size for them! Oops.

It’s ok, we gave Danilo the recipe so he can make a bigger, more manly batch later.

Here’s the recipe for you too if you want to try making these yummy treats (based on Michael Ruhlman’s recipe):

Pâte à Choux

Yield: 80 small choux or 40 – 50 bigger choux

The following is a standard recipe for basic pâte a choux. To make cheese puffs, or any savory preparation, add two tablespoons of Parmigiano-Reggiano to the dough along with the eggs (top with more cheese to bake them). For a sweet puff, add two tablespoons of sugar to the water and butter as you heat it.

This recipe can be made all in the same pot using a stiff wood spoon, but it’s easier, and the dough puffs more, if you use a standing mixer with a paddle attachment or an electric hand mixer to beat in the eggs.

Ingredients:

* 1 cup water
* 1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
* 1 cup flour
* 1 cup eggs (4 large eggs)

1. Bring the water and butter to a simmer over high heat.

2. Reduce the heat to medium, add the flour and stir rapidly. The flour will absorb the water quickly and a dough will form and pull away from the sides. Keep stirring to continue cooking the flour and cook off some of the water, another minute or two.

3.Transfer the paste a bowl (with high edges if you are using a hand mixer)

4. Add the eggs one at a time mixing rapidly until each is combined into the paste.
The paste will go from shiny to furry, slippery to sticky as the egg is incorporated.

5. Pipe or spoon the pâte à choux onto a baking sheet

6. Bake in a hot oven (220°C/425°F for 10 minutes, 180°C/350°F for another 30 minutes or so)

Voilà!

I actually brought acrylic paint on the ship thinking I would paint my heart away. It turns out that my fear of being bored has been totally slapped in the face. I brought a lot of projects on board and have not attended to all of them, therefore “producing” only 2 paintings. I am definitely not complaining! Not being bored is a blessing.

Back in San Francisco, recommended by a dear FM coworker, I downloaded the ToonPAINT iPhone application, which turns any photo you take with the iPhone into a cartoon-looking simplification. I remember taking some photos of San Francisco and thought it would be fun to use the simplified lines as an inspiration and turn it into a painting.

That’s what I did with some container ship photos. I wanted to try and make a very cartoon looking painting. Or more like old comic book style. This is what I came up with… I could just imagine Spider Man jumping on one of those containers any time:

That style was fun, but not very “me”. I have a natural, non-technical sort of impressionist style (much like the way I painted the Vieux-Nice) which I wanted to toy around with. So once more, using the simple lines of a cartoonified image, here is the Cap Cleveland going through the Gaillard Cut of the Panama Canal, more Stephanie style:

This feels a lot better to me.