Kiwi 360

 Our next stop was at Te Puke for Kiwi 360. We had lunch in the cafe -- most of us trying interesting kiwi fare. Cameron and I had the kiwi hotcakes, and Maia and Cameron sampled the kiwi juice.

After lunch, we loaded up for a tour of the kiwifruit farm. It was interesting to learn how several local farmers started working on variations of the Chinese Gooseberry independently and at about the same time.

This is what made the kiwifruit stop so important to our tour of the North Island -- it is very New Zealand!

We stopped and picked some kiwi up to bring home and ripen, then moved around to another area of the farm to check out the PSA, a disease which has ravaged the gold kiwi crops after pollen that had been impacted was imported. We wrapped up the tour with samples in the gift shop, which included some kiwi wine and liquor. Different, sort of reminded me of the rhubarb wine from Culbertson, Montana.

Did you know?

A serving of two kiwifruit contains:

*More vitamin C than two oranges
*The potassium of a banana
*All the fiber of a bowl of bran
Kiwifruit are also rich in lutein, an antioxidant known to reduce the risk of cancer and heart disease.

Family Vacation
Tauranga