The Naiad’s* time in New Zealand is almost up.  For the last 4 months she’s been chefing at a fancy lodge in the Hawkes Bay.  She’s just finished working, so I flew up to visit her, and to spend a little time seeing the Hawkes Bay before she flies off to spend a year on working holiday in Australia. I visited the Hawkes Bay when I was first in NZ, and had a lovely time, but other than two slightly disastrous road-trips through in the ensuing years, I really haven’t spent any quality time there.  Time to rectify that! So what is the Hawkes Bay?  It’s everything between the big curve on the East Coast of the lower North Island of New Zealand and the nearest range of mountains.  The climate is perfect for vineyards, stonefruit orchards, apple orchards, berry farms, kiwifruit orchards, and every other sort of agricultural endeavor, giving it the nickname of the ‘fruitbowl of NZ’. In other words, Dreamstress heaven.  I’m all about fruit.  And the countryside.  Which is what most …