What are baby sheep called?

Yesterday Ashley, Kathy, Bonnie, Kathrynn, Jasmine, Ning and I rented a Previa from one of the car hires on Beach Road and I got behind the wheel and we headed north to SHEEPWORLD.

SheepWorld is about a 50 minute drive up Highway 1, and driving really wasn't so bad. After I realized the parking break was on, it was pretty much smooth sailing. We had to rely on New Zealand radio because no one has one of those connect-your-mp3-player devices, but even that wasn't so bad. I'm secretly a huge fan of Chris Brown and the new Weezer song.

We got to SheepWorld about four minutes after the "eel feeding" was scheduled to begin, but it was cancelled anyway so Kathy's disappointment wasn't the fault of my old-lady driving tendencies. I really wish we got to see the eel feeding, though, because I'm so confused. Eels? At SheepWorld? Why? I would really like a little context there.

We asked the old lady who sold us our tickets whether we could have a group rate for the seven of us, and she said that unfortunately, they only do group rates for groups of 10 or more, but she would give us some bags of feed for the animals! Usually you have to pay a buck for that stuff. So, that was cool. We got to feed all the animals on the grounds. It was like a petting zoo-- there were all these farm animals are kind of penned but kind of just hanging out, and they come up in your face and eat out of your hand... it was fun.

After our little self-guided tour of the grounds, we went into the barn for the sheep & dog show, where this Kiwi shepherd Rob showed us how his two dogs help him round up sheep. It was kind of cool... I kind of felt like the dogs were just running around, but I guess that's what they're there for.

Then Rob had an audience volunteer help herd them into different pens (based on a color stripe on their fleece), and Bonnie was that volunteer! She did a pretty good job. I think she might have a career in shepherding.

Then Rob showed us how to shear a sheep, which looks pretty inhumane. The sheep he was shearing had never had a haircut before and was pretty uncomfortable with it, so that was awkward. I understand that sheep get sheared for the own health, so knowing that helped. And the sheep looked quite nice after his haircut. And there was no blood.

After the shearing, all these five-to-ten day old BABY LAMBS came out and we got to bottle-feed them! Sooo cuuuuuute. I called them "baby sheep" and like, four Kiwis called me out on it. I guess in a country where sheep outnumber people four to one, you should know how to call them at any age.

We hit up the gift store after washing our hands (of course), which is really the reason wanted to go to SheepWorld. Yarn.

They actually didn't have a great selection. I was disappointed. I wanted something chunky, but they only had sportweight, and they didn't have many color selections. I made a purchase, though. I mean, you can never have too much yarn. It's still NZ wool. It's actually quite beautiful, in shades of purple.

I considered some Canterbury boots, too, New Zealand's answer to Uggs. They were beeeaaaauuutiful, but $225 NZD. I just couldn't justify it. I might buy them at a later date, though. They're so gorgeous.

After SheepWorld, we headed south, but stopped a few places on the way home just because we could. We stopped at the New Zealand Honey Centre, which was really a nice place and I would like to officially tour it some day. We also stopped at a beautiful beach because I'm in New Zealand and you can just pull off the road at any given place and dip your toes into the Pacific.

In all, it was a beautiful little day trip. We were going to go to the Auckland Zoo today, but it's gross-raining and no one wants to traipse around the zoo in spitting rain. Gag. So... I'll probably clean the bathrooms in my apartment and go to FoodTown. Such is life.

Photos of farm animals for you to enjoy!