A Riot of Colour- Fields of Tulips, Southland

Catch-up (October 28, 2019)

From Cromwell we headed back to Southland to look after our Winton family's house and cat while they were away for a couple of weeks. I was very pleased to find out that our visit coincided with an event that has been on my bucket list for a very long time.

On just one day a year- Labour Day- Triflor NZ Ltd, an Edendale tulip bulb exporter opens up one of their large paddocks for the public to visit and view an amazing display of flowers. The flowers aren't for picking though, they will cut and mulched and the bulbs will then be harvested soon after the open day.

It's 54km from Winton to Edendale and as I wanted to be there when the gates opened at 10am, I was up and ready to go well ahead of time.  I zig-zagged my way across Southland and was delighted to find several paddocks of colourful tulips along the back roads, about 20 kilometres before Edendale. I was ahead of schedule and had time to stop and photograph them as well.

There was plenty of parking at Triflor headquarters but it was filling fast when I arrived just before 10am. The event is used a fundraiser for the Edendale Presbyterian Church, Edendale Scouts and Wyndham Lions Club; there was a small market in progress inside one of the sheds and a queue forming for the guided tours (gold coin donation). 

Several small passenger vans took visitors on a tiki-tour around the local area; along country roads and down farm tracks and past many of the tulip fields that can't be seen from the road. Dairy cows, looking a little out of place beside the mass plantings of vibrantly coloured tulips, watched curiously from the other side of fences as the procession of vehicles passed by.

Five companies lease or own 350ha in Southland, growing and exporting 175 million tulip bulbs every season. Trifor, the largest company, have 100ha and exports around 55 million bulbs each year. Several companies lease land from local dairy farmers or swap land use with them as the bulbs need to be grown on rotation every 7-8 years. 

About 80% of the bulbs are exported the United States and the rest to Holland, Norway, Finland and Russia. Southland has excellent soils, good rainfall and cool weather which are all required to grow high quality tulips bulbs. 

The bulbs are harvested during January & February and sent to the northern hemisphere where they are raised in hot houses and timed to bloom during the northern winter when flower prices are higher.

Visitors to the open day aren't allowed to pick the flowers and they also need to stay near the beginning of the rows so the bulbs aren't damaged.  When queried as to why the flowers weren't picked for sale to the flower industry in NZ or exported, the grower answered 'Who wants 170 million tulip blooms?' and "When did your partner last buy you a dozen tulips?' 

The rows of blooms are inspected for imperfections and odd colours and those bulbs removed before harvest.

Although some unusual ones may make the grade. The 'cauliflower' looking tulip in the centre of the mosaic below was one such bulb a few years ago. It's protege have been painstakingly cultivated each season and now there are several short rows of the plant. 

It wasn't a surprise to see that not many people were stopping to admire it though. The brilliant colours of all the others by far and away overshadowed the muted tones and odd shape of this quirk of nature.

It was hard to choose a favourite colour, they were all stunning but I loved the deep wine colour of these ones. I imagine that they would be a very popular colour for bridal bouquets.

How to stand out in a crowd.

And talking about crowds, dozens of people had arrived at the sheds by the time our tour van arrived back at the display paddock, the large carpark was full and many vehicles now lined the narrow country roads outside the farm. Over a 1000 people visited the farm this year, the largest crowd ever.

Inside the shed the queue for the tours snaked back and forward across the floor and a lot of visitors had opted to walk straight down to the tulip paddock. And in fact, as a photographer, I would do this next time. The tour was good but there were no photo opportunities and it was over an hour before we came back to the display. 

There was still plenty of room for me to take photos in amongst the visitors taking their ultimate selfies or photos of their children dressed in their Sunday best.

There are many migrant families working on dairy farms in Southland & Otago and I know that bright colours and beautiful flowers are a feature in their cultures. I'm sure many photos of treasured grandchildren were sent to families overseas that night.

A Riot of Colour

If you haven't already, click on a photo to enlarge it and then use your direction arrows to scroll back & forward through the photos, the colours are just spectacular (or perhaps it's just me, but I can't get enough of looking at this amazing sight).

Of course I photographed each and every row and from several different angles until I finally reached the far side of the field and when I turned to head back to the sheds, there was still a mass of people arriving.

Further to the south the weather looked to be about to take a turn for the worse and I wanted to check out a couple of the paddocks we'd seen on our tour earlier in the day. Our driver had pointed out side roads where there were tulips that could be seen from the road.

This sea of pink took my breath away, what a fabulous colour (and possibly my new favourite) and as you can see I couldn't get enough of them. Anyone want 50 photos of pink tulips?

But I lingered a little too long at the pink tulip parade and when I next looked up I could see the weather front was just about on top of me. There was one more field (actually two) that I wanted to see before I headed home, this one of white tulips when the rain started to fall...

...and one back near the main road where the heavens opened up and all hell broke loose. I managed to grab a few shots but not before getting a total drenching in the heavy downpour. 

Afterwards as I passed Triflors on my way home, dozens of people were still arriving, walking along the road in their finery and without umbrellas or wet weather gear. Others were struggling back to their cars, some parked over a kilometre away, looking like drowned rats. It was such a shame the day ended liked that but I was so pleased I arrived early.

Several days later I was back in the area and thought I'd look in on the tulip fields (as you do) that I hadn't had the time to check out when it was raining.

These reds and oranges were very vibrant, it was just a pity I could only stand at the side of the road to take photos. Given half the chance I'd have been in their amongst it again.

I also stopped at the Triflors display tulip field, this time at the other end to where we'd all been just days earlier. A dairy herd was slowly wandering back to their paddock after milking, along the track we'd been on the other day. Even though I knew what the outcome was going to be it was still quite sad to see that the de-heading machine had been through and most of rows of glorious coloured tulips had been unceremoniously chopped!

Petals & broken blooms lay in the furrows between the plants. It was such a sorry sight to see after such beauty but at least they had had their one day of glory.

A City Rebuilding - Christchurch; Part 2

Catch-up

Continuing on from Part 1

On the corner of Cashel Street and Oxford Terrace there's a new concept in shopping; a pop-up mall made from a colourful collection of shipping containers. 

The temporary Re:START Mall has allowed many central city retailers to trade while permanent buildings are being built around them. And it's helped bring people back to the inner city.

A symbol of Christchurch's rebirth, the Re:Start Mall has already been relocated once, from a site further down Cashel Street, as new developments get under way.

The Re:Start Mall has had such a positive response from residents & visitors alike that there's talk of it becoming a permanent fixture of the new city centre, albeit not on the site it occupies at the moment. 

There are some very interesting sculptures located in the alleyways between the shopping containers. Entitled Avonside Drive, Hannah Kidd has designed four characters; everyday heroes based on people she saw in Christchurch communities offering gestures of kindness, supporting others, or maintaining familiar routines, following the earthquakes. 

Made from recycled roofing tin and steel, each character has a name; Mrs Parsons, Noel Peterson, Timothy Stableman & Tanya Brown, - an elderly lady peeping through her blinds, a man in his suit watering his local school garden (I missed capturing him), a man mowing an absent neighbour's lawn and a woman feeding stray red zone cats. They are fabulous pieces of art, I just love the look on the animals' faces, especially the adoring look on that little dog's face, the artist has captured them well. 

I finish wandering through the Re;START Mall and make my way back out onto Cashel Street. This is looking back towards the Bridge of Remembrance and it's the first time I get a sense of deja-vu, the trees and tramlines remind me of the pre-quake pedestrian mall. As does the facade of Ballantynes, Christchurch's iconic department store to my left which was one of the first shops to reopen, 8 months after the quake.

I'm heading east along Cashel Street now, the afternoon is drawing in but I still have a couple of sites I want to visit. There are many abandoned and derelict buildings along the way...

...some look abandoned but behind the boarded-up exteriors- like the Pagoda Court building here- work has begun on gutting the interior and rebuilding retail spaces inside the earthquake-sound structures.

One of the reasons I was keen to visit the inner city was to capture some of the many street art murals around the city. In 2014, the RISE Street Art Festival commissioned more than a dozen street art paintings to be painted on some of the larger blank walls in the city. This one on Manchester Street is by Jacob Yikes, one of the city's most active street artists.

Many are now disappearing due to the rebuild, including my old favourite, The Ballerina and this one called 'Blueprints' which is on the site of the old Westpac Tower.

Parts of Cashell Street & High Street are closed due to a very large crane being dismantled and loaded onto two truck and trailer units. It's the reason the tram tour I took earlier in the day was discounted, as it couldn't travel around this section of the city.

I pass a forlorn looking 'Urban Living Wall' on the corner of High Street. I'm not so sure the vision has quite hit the mark- Through this project we aim to create urban spaces and make nature a part of the city's fabric, with more places for plants, insects, spiders, small creatures, biodiversity and a greener urban environment- I think the spiders will be the only ones appreciating it.

As the sign says...

Further on along Cashell Street I finally reach one of the sites I wanted to visit; 185 Empty Chairs, is a poignant tribute to the 185 people who lost their lives in the earthquake.  

Click to enlarge... 185 Empty Chairs by Pete Majendie

The chairs' future is uncertain, like the re;Start Mall, they have also been moved once. Originally placed on the site of the Oxford Tce Baptist Church they are now on the site of another quake-destroyed church; St Paul's Trinity Presbyterian Church. 

It's a very moving memorial made all the more so because of the uniqueness of each individual chair representing the victims, including a baby's car seat.

If I had lost a family member or friend in the quake I could see that I would have selected a suitable chair to come and visit, to sit and contemplate, to reflect and remember that person. 

I'm not sure if it's by design or not, but this new site is diagonally opposite the site of the CTV building whose collapse saw the most loss of life (115 people) in the quake. 

And directly opposite the Chairs is the Christchurch Transitional Cathedral also known as the Cardboard Cathedral due to the 98, 16-20 metre, 120kg cardboard tubes used in the ceiling construction. Each tube is coated in polyurethane, and laminated timber has been inserted for strength. This is the world's only cathedral made substantially of cardboard.

The Cardboard Cathedral's triangular window design has 49, 1.2 metre tall panels which incorporate images from the Cathedral's original rose window (which was lost in the later June 2011 earthquake quake). And although the Cathedral is temporary, it's expected to have a life span of over 50 years....surely enough time to sort out the legal battle on the future of it's predecessor. 

Loud voices and laughter carry across the empty lots as I make my way back to my carpark; groups of construction workers on their way home after a busy day's work.

I have time to capture a few more pieces of street art along the way. This is 'Calendar Girl' by Seb Humphreys, a three story high naked woman that adorned the side of the Calender Girl Strip Club building. I say 'adorned' because she is no longer. Just a couple of weeks after I took her photo, the building was demolished. 

Les Mills' less risque lady was smiling at her opposition across the empty space. 

More street art by Jacob Yikes; a mexican restaurant on the corner of Hereford & Manchester Street simply called 'Mexico'.

I pass the old State Insurance building- which was the Arts & Design College at the time of the quake. It seems a little ironic that it's future is still in limbo because of an insurance dispute.

I cut back past the Heritage Hotel at the back of Cathedral Square, squeezing through a gap in the chain fencing and ducking under some wonky railing separating a number of empty lots, one of which used to hold the Heritage Tower building and carpark- a place where we would have parked our rental, while staying at the Heritage, on our visits to Christchurch.

All that is left of the multi-story buildings that filled this large space is a concrete stairway.

And around the walls that surround this temporary carpark which straddles the old Westpac Lane are dozens of pieces of street art and graffiti. Cookie Monster competes with a Prince memorial, there are many elaborate designs in an explosion of colour and with varying degrees of talent; all vying for attention as I wander past.

Here graffiti has covered up one Jacob Yikes' larger art works.

I'm parked in the carpark below this abandoned high-rise on Hereford Street, the former Christchurch International College building known as Malvern House which seems to have been the target not only of graffiti artists but squatters and vandals too. Just 3 days previous, a fire was set inside the building late at night, most probably squatters trying to keep warm.

It's time to head back to Weedons, a journey that takes me at least 45 minutes due to rush hour traffic. I've enjoyed my day exploring the Red Zone, even though it was a little sad in places. I take my hat off to the stoic people of Christchurch, Christchurch certainly is a city rebuilding but it still has a long way to go. 

And I still have much more to see; I'll have to do another walking tour the next time we are in Christchurch to join a few more dots. 

If you'd like to see more of my Christchurch photos from the day click on this link.