This site is for the Heathcote, Horotane or Avoca Valleys and is written up by the people who live here. Feel free to look around and see what is happening at the moment, find out what we have for sale and catch up on the local news.
Did You Know?
This site is live!
You write in and we update it. That means the news you read here is always changing. So come on Heathcote, be sure to send your story now and come back soon to see it in print!
Our new gallery is open.
The Heathcote Photo Gallery is worth a visit. It's full of interesting photos of our valley from past to present. Our gallery never shuts!
Who's Online?
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Sunday, 24 August 2008 |
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[Editor: Eleven years old Rata Ingram writes about skiing the Big Mama run at Porters Heights on the recent Heathcote Valley School ski trip for Years Seven and Eight. Her mum, Gail, has sent it in for us and says Big Mama is a double black diamond (super advanced!) and yes, she enjoyed it too.]
"I'm not so sure about this mum" I think as I glide across the soft
powder. Mum has disappeared into the fog. I push my poles into the
powder as I slow on the thick cornflour-like surface to catch up. She sees me and quickly warns me of the rocks on the ground. Only
just managing to avoid them, I ski in mum's tracks across the icy patch
and into a snowdrift.
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Friday, 22 August 2008 |
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It's a few suburbs over from the Heathcote Valley, but I bet we've all been there. Sumner beach is a great place for a sunny day out. The surf, seagulls and sand must have given a lot of fun to Heathcote people over many years. Trouble is, it's also a place that faces a lot of issues. The Christchurch City Council know this, and they've done what they usually do for this type of thing, written a hefty report. The difference this time is that it comes with an absolutely fantastic graphic. It makes what's on the mind of Sumner, Clifton and Monck's Bay residents really clear for us. It's also beautiful too, so take a look!
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Steam locomotive W192 writes! |
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Saturday, 16 August 2008 |
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[Editor: We have just received, amazingly, an article from Ferrymead's steam locomotive W192! Don't know who W192 is? You can read all about him here. Thanks to Nigel Hogg of the Canterbury Railway Society for getting him to write it. Here it is...]
First of all I must say thank you to everybody who has come to visit me at my home at Ferrymead Heritage Park in the Heathcote Valley. I enjoy your company so much because you always seem so happy to see me. You must forgive me for not writing earlier, but I am getting very forgetful now I am so old. I was made in 1889, which makes me 119 years old!
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Friday, 01 August 2008 |
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Call them Solanum tuberosum, papa, pomme de terre, patata, riwai, de aardappel, pratie, ziemniak, kartoffel, potatis, the humble spud or tatie, 2008 has been declared "The Year of the Potato" by the United Nations.
As broccoli
romps up the trendy, must eat, life saving popularity list the humble spud has
been relegated, by the cognoscenti of such things, to the lower rungs of the
evil ladder along with sugar, butter, pork crackling and pink icing. Thank
goodness, on this occasion, the United Nations has taken a sensible lead in
lauding this amazing food source. Christchurch
Botanic Gardens had a wonderful trial plot of organic potatoes during the
summer, nearly a dozen varieties. Alison and Simon Holst were invited down to
cook them on the spot. So, this
summer season why not try to grow a few potatoes of your own?
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Monday, 11 August 2008 |
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“Cr Yani Johanson
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
to our local MP, Ruth Dyson, on this issue.” It appears that not everybody is prepared to quietly accept the proposed zoning changes to our Heathcote horizon. Multi-storey buildings, hotels, shops, homes and offices may be on the agenda for some, but not before our community gets a chance to have another say. The Christchurch City Council has appealed the Environment Court's decision to allow the rezoning of the land around Ferrymead in the High Court. A result is expected in approximately two months.
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Tuesday, 05 August 2008 |
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When I was very small I was tucked into bed at night with a pink silk quilt. I
thought it was beautiful, but I didn't much like the reverse side. This was
made up of small squares of different coloured materials stitched together.
Most of them very strongly resembled the fabric that had made up some of
my father's old work trousers and that didn't impress me at all. I suspected
that the quilt was filled with layers of old blankets that had worn too thin to
be used on their own. But this was war time.
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Thursday, 17 July 2008 |
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Grahame Felton must be one of our older Heathcote Valley residents and he has lived here now for ten years. He has kindly agreed to list some of the features that make our valley special. There are many possibilities for a list like this of course, so we asked Grahame to pick his top ten reasons to live in Heathcote. Taken together, they are why Grahame and his wife Doreen "desire to stay in the valley for the rest of our lives". For these two, particularly as Grahame is now 90, the valley will always be home.
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Clickety clack, railway track |
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Friday, 25 July 2008 |
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Many years ago, I was a school teacher and I taught at Lyttelton Main School. I loved Lyttelton, I
loved the school, the pupils and the staff. I loved the trip in the train, driving through what was still
mostly countryside and stopping at all the quaint little stations along the way: Woolston, Opawa and
Heathcote. What I didn't love was getting up early enough in the morning to bike from upper
Manchester Street to the railway station in Moorehouse Avenue to catch the last possible train to
get me to school on time.
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Monday, 21 July 2008 |
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Once again we have a very loved member of our
family missing.
On 4 June, our beautiful cat Buddy did not come in after his night
prowl from our home on Flinders Road.
Buddy is a 15 months old, ginger tabby with a spotted
stomach. He's a bit timid and was wearing a fluro yellow
collar with bell attached when he went missing.
This has been a real shock to us as his (full) brother Cashew went missing in January this year.
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Monday, 14 July 2008 |
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[Editor: The depth of Peter Parsnip's gardening knowledge has encouraged Clarissa Carrot to write in for advice to an urgent problem.]
Hi Peter, I have a problem that I hope you can help me with. I still have a great
crop of strawberries in my garden but unfortunately they are all going
mouldy before they ripen and some are even turning jet black. What is
causing this and can they be saved?
Peter replies: If you still have strawberries at this time
of the year they will be suffering horribly. The problem is the fungus
disease, grey mould or botrytis. Cause is damp, cold and the berries resting on the wet soil.
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