Country Life for 25 December 2009

A selection of highlights from 2009 - Some of the world's most fearless kayakers fly through rapids in a Bliss Stick kayak. The boats are made in a woolshed down a lonely road, half an hour's drive from Taihape. Canterbury wool classer and sheep racing trainer David Cone drills his fastest sheep into shape in a paddock outside Christchurch. Graeme Williams farms a steep, stunning, erosion prone sheep and beef station on the North Island's East Coast. He farms with only 12 paddocks and has planted 50 thousand trees. He proposed to his wife-to-be after a weeklong courtship. Both are bush poets.