Oyster Gathering

My World for this week.

Oyster Gathering at Moetapu Bay.
On a cold frosty morning we decided to go out oyster gathering, we packed a nice picnic lunch with a big flask of hot coffee, and 2 buckets to put the oysters in.
It was quite a long drive to Moetapu bay, way round the Marlborough Sound, over the hills into the Mahau Sound, the tide was fully out leaving lots of the beach and rocks on show.
By the time we arrived at Moetapu Bay, another rather remote part of the Marlborough Sounds, the sun was well and truly out and shining beautifully on the waters, as is usual in our climate it was quite hot at 10.30am in time to set out down the beach to check out whether there were still plenty of the Pacific Rock Oysters on the rocks within the bay, as it is some years since we last went gathering. Sure enough the rocks were loaded with large wavey shells with nice big oysters inside.
Took us no time to fill the buckets, even though we had to break them off the rocks they were clinging to. I got lucky and a couple of the hard shells broke leaving exposed the soft juicy oyster flesh, which I quickly scooped out and gobbled down, yumm so rich and salty.The lovely view from our picnic chairs, notice that the sky was clouding over and the sun was vanishing fast.

We then set up a wee table and a couple of chairs in the sun and prepared our delicious picnic lunch, while enjoying a sensational view of the Sounds, as seen through the small bushes and reeds in front of us.
After relaxing on the shore for a while exploring the area, we decided to drive right to the end of the road before driving all the way back home again.
Ofcause, only half of the job had been completed, those lovely oysters were not at all keen on being opened and eaten, it was a big long job opening them, we worked together as a team and eventually all those oysters were in the big bowl awaiting being cooked. We had two really good meals of oysters in batter with chips, made oyster chowder of all the broken pieces, and still had enough to freeze enough for another two meals at a later date.
A very satisfying enjoyable day, we shall repeat in a month or two.






Large clumps of Pacific Oysters growing on the rocks within the bay.