Lost But Hoppy: Soggy Bottom

On November 28^th, I packed up my stuff, said thanks and bye to Sven, Softy, and Speedy (the dogs), and took a bus to Nguarwahia in the afternoon to start wwoofing at Soggy Bottom Rare Breeds Pig farm. I didn’t know a lot about the place but it sounded a lot more like what I was looking for. I knew they had two teenage boys, lived on 20 acres of hilly land, raised rare breed pigs, and operated a butchery on the farm.

A few hours later, Sara Walker picked me up and we drove through the hilly countryside to the family’s house. I was happy to be going somewhere where I would be a little busier, and get to live with an actual family for a while. Not just that but another wwoofer, Pheobe, had gotten there the same day. I was excited to meet someone doing the same thing I was.

One day Phoebe and I sliced and packaged bacon in the morning and then made gallons of lard from the left over fat by melting it in the oven. One of many things I never imagined i would learn how to do.

The next two and a half weeks were everything that I had wanted to get out of wwoofing and more. Pheobe and I usually met up at the breakfast table before setting off on a big atv dune buggy thing to drive around a whole network of narrow dirt roads through the hilly maze of soggy bottom to feed all 3 dozen or so pigs. After an hour or so of that, we either helped Jono in the butchery making and packaging bacon, burgers, and sausages. Lots and lots of sausages. When I wasn’t busy doing that, most of the time I spent on one building project or another, something I really loved doing at Soggy Bottom. It didn’t take long to convince Jono that I could use the woodshop and do a reasonably good job on whatever needed to be built on the farm. First he had me finish paneling and putting battons on two walls of a shed that had taken 18 months to complete. Once I put the gutters on, it was pretty much complete and it felt great to actually have skills that are useful on a farm. Raising animals, gardening, all that stuff is pretty new to me and during the first week Pheobe definitely outshined me when it came to knowledge of the natural world. But carpentry, that’s something I could teach her about and we had a good time hammering some nails all day.

After finishing the shed, Jono let me get to work on the family tree house. Deep in the woods tucked in the back of soggy bottom, there is a tree house suspended between 4 trees. It was a personal project of the families but as they were so busy and the two boys were still too young, they trusted me to wire the walls for electrical, put the insulation in and finish the walls with paneling. By the time I left soggy bottom, the place looked great and I was proud to have worked on it.

Letting an over-confident 12 year old drive me around some pretty crazy dirt roads in what could be the shire in an atv.

In the evenings, when the sun started to get lower and it cooled off a bit, we drove up to one of the highest spots at soggy bottom where the garden was at the top of a hill. I got to learn a little bit about gardening and it felt good to get our hands in the dirt, even after a long day. New Zealand is just a beautiful place and when the sun starts to sink in the sky, the light changes in drastic ways that you don’t get in the U.S. I don’t know if it’s because we’re so far south but the air is just different here. There is always a couple of hours at the end of the day when everything starts to glow and there’s always a sunset behind some distant mountain range wherever you are.

One of the unique things about New Zealand is it’s do-it-yourself attitude you see everywhere. Maybe it’s just the circles that I have been running in, but the people I meet always seem to have so many skills and plenty of confidence in themselves to tackle big projects. The walkers moved to New Zealand from England 7 years ago with the goal of starting a pig farm and butchery. They didn’t have much money and didn’t even have a home to live in. With 20 acres newly added to their name, they spent the first few weeks in New Zealand converting an old sheep shearing shed into something livable until they could get a proper house built. Maybe it looked desperate and pathetic at the time but I don’t know if I’ve ever lived in a more comfortable home. From the outside, it truly looks like a big shed, with corrugated steal walls and a sliding barn door for an entrance. On the inside, the walls, floor, and ceiling are roughly finished and the huge area was divided into a few bedrooms with the main living area kept open and spacious. With high ceilings, comfy sofas, and big wood slab tables, the house is primitive but felt luxurious. I’ve never met anyone before who could move into a sheep shed and turn it into something this beautiful. Who in America would even try? Every day at Soggy Bottom, I felt lucky to be a part of something that felt so unique and memorable.

Waikato is a region dominated by dairy farming. This is the view from Soggy Bottoms driveway, just in the foothills of the Hakarimata Scenic Reserve looking into the plains. Remind you of the party tree? This spot is also only about 15 miles from where the shire was filmed.

Sometimes after dinner, we would grab a beer and drive up the highest hill on the farm to watch the sunset. Pheobe and Mallory.

My first night at Soggy Bottom, Finn, the 15 year old asked if I want to go out and help him hunt possums. Not wanting to turn anybody down my first night there, I found myself carrying a .22 rifle and stumbling through thick jungle-like forest after a terrifying atv ride on dirt roads in the dark. In New Zealand, there are a lot of non-native animals that are considered pests because they really hurt the plant and bird population by eating everything they see. One thing that a 15 year old can do to help the health of his families land was to go out a few times a week after the sun sets and kill a few possums. He told me how this genuinely makes him feel good to be able to help the environment and how lucky he was to be growing up in a position to see how his and his families actions directly impact the land and the environment. Coming from a kid, this was pretty heavy stuff.

The two and a half weeks spent on this farm flew by in the end. The work was hard but rewarding, the bookshelves were filled with non-fiction gems (I must have read 4 books while there), and the fridge was filled with almost entirely food that had been traded for at various farmers markets for a packet of sausage or two by Jono. After work I would take a run up to the Hakarimata Scenic Reserve and use whatever energy I had left running up and down steep logging roads and sometimes all the way up to a cell phone tower at the very top.

After running in the mountains, feeling invigorated.

This calf was rejected by its herd and left to die in the mud over the winter. Jono saved it and now it spends its days wandering around the farm looking sad, but cheers up a little if you pet him.

Some wwoof hosts appreciate your help during the time you work but really prefer to leave you up to your own the rest of the time. The walkers couldn’t have been more inviting during the off hours. They took Phoebe and I to friends houses to swim, barbecues they were invited to, and even a trip to the cinema to see the new Harry Potter movie.

By the time after two and a half weeks there I knew it was time to move on. Though they would have been a great family to spend Christmas and New Years with, I had visions of heading to the Corromandel Peninsula to find someplace with more young travellers who were also spending the holidays away from home. After getting a lift to Hamilton by Torben, a german wwoofer who had just arrived, I jumped on a bus to the small town of Waihi.