Feilding is a lovely little town, and embraces it’s farming heritage. The Feilding Saleyards have been going since 1880, and 100 head of cattle were the sold at the first sale The huge sale yards cover 3.7 hectares and has 350 sheep pens, 140 cattle pens and (latterly) 45 pens for deer. The Saleyards Tour has been on our list of things to do for sometime – it is very popular with tourists and it is a matter of remembering to book a ticket in advance so we can attend.
Feilding Salesyards
The Salesyard Silhouette was erected in memory of shepherds and drovers, together with their horses and dogs who mustered and drove the sheep and cattle to both the yards and railway. They made a huge contribution to Feilding becoming a premier stock sale centre.
Silhouette outside the Salesyard
The imposing clock tower in the square is another Feilding icon.
On Thursday morning a whole posse of cars, a beautifully restored Mercedes and a rather grunty looking BMW bike pulled up down our end of the car park. The Coach House Museum volunteers were having their weekly meeting and the campers were cordially invited to join them for “smoko”. What a great morning it was. After everyone had enjoyed a cuppa and biscuit, we were asked to introduce ourselves, and relate our travel plans. Then the reminiscing started – tales of things which went wrong during the volunteers working lives. Tractors catching fire, paint booths filled with smoke, machines arcing and sparking – each volunteer was trying to outdo the others with their disaster stories.
This old beauty was rolled out of the museum for an hour or two in the sunshine – a wonderful Ford Model T.
Model T
4eez rolled around and there was a mild moment of panic – where were our folding chairs? Because of the wet weather we hadn’t used them for several days. Then we remembered, we had taken them over to the hall at Marton NZMCA camp but had used the plastic chairs instead, and left them there. There was nothing for it, Robin had to drive back to Marton to collect our chairs, which luckily were right we we had left them. Terry from the Mobile Kiwi Crib joined us for 4zees in the sunshine and told us he had been on the road for many years, doing jobs all around the country. “Life’s a working holiday”, he told us.
Terry’s rig parked up at the museum
After three days here it is time to move on. Next stop, Lees Reserve.
1 comment:
Fielding sounds really interesting. You certainly have come across some unusual caravans in this trip.
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