PIA Southern Field Days - Day 2

PIA Southern Field Days Day 2 Blog

It’s breakfast at 6am with the first challenge of the day presenting itself in the form of the cereal dispenser. Quite the conundrum as one by one the lads contemplated the technological wonder in front of them. Did you know that a mullet has similar qualities to a magic lamp? A quick scratch and vola! A light bulb moment, muesli is dispensed and famine is averted.

7am and we head off to Waimumu via mullet country (Gore). It's quite an international moment as on gazing out the window we discover the natives look like us. Long-haired males as far as the eye can see.

Arrival at the field days sees us in the preferential parking we are used to. A wee skip to the gate and we are in.

It's a tad damp so the full PIA kit gets a workout. Top-to-toe branding, just how we like it. It's straight to work meeting “our kind of people” and a plan is made for the day.

The first stop is Fonterra. Joy, the tanker simulator is back. Tom C leaps into position, and as the holder of a Learner Licence and having spent time observing team leaders' superior driving skills he declares, “I’ve got this!” Mere moments later it is obvious that This is not got, he is removed quick-smart and replaced by Emily. The group unanimously agrees that in being female, Emily is clearly gifted. But disaster! If we hadn’t been there we wouldn’t have believed it. She got motion sickness inside the first kilometre. Who knew you could get car sick in a simulator. We park up in the VIP area and feel obliged to sample the product.

The next couple of hours are spent popping around the various sites with regular check-ins back at the fencing (South Island Doubles are on).

Emily & Lilly compete in the Rural Women's competition: milk a cow, name calf stomachs, ride an electric bike, put up a fence etc. The girls do us proud with Emily coming 4th overall.

Back to the fencing and we have a walk-through with Nick Leifting, our champion fencer, then it's all hands on deck for a few hours dismantling the fences in the rain which has been steady all day.

We boost it back to Telford for the night, introduce the students to the washing machines and head off on a self guided tour of the campus. We duck down in our seats as our Superior Driver in attempting to find the Telford dairy farm ends up at some random dairy shed. Hightailing it out with sirens ringing in our ears we practise, in case anyone asks we are from Opihi College.

Quotes and Highlights.

● Richard “Straw is a lifestyle, silage is a job”

● Team Leader manages to be presented with a set of prizes - Just Coz.

● You look like an intellectual giant.

● We feature in the Autumn Farmlander edition and the Ashburton Guardian today so its autographs all around.

● If you were just a little more co-ordinated we wouldn’t be having this conversation.

● John embraces the whole “speed limit is a guide” concept. Team Leader is proud.

● At every check-in on the group chat the reply from the boys to, “Where are you”? Answer: “At the tractor Pulls. The grunting can be heard back home!!”

● The music selection improves once the girls take charge and it's Tractor Bangers all the way.

● Team Leader, “rules are for the others”

● Team Leader to Richard, “You’re softer than you look”

● Lachie to John, “Mum’s hugs are better”

● Finally, Pineapple in the main course is just wrong