Blogger over the moon with win and lifestyle | Wairarapa News | Local News in Wairarapa

Take a well-heeled chap from Detroit's sprawling suburbia, condition him to big-city living in Tokyo and then plonk him in the sleepy hinterland of rural Martinborough - with 500 olive trees to tend.

It's the oft-hilarious results of that fish-out-of-water scenario which has seen Jared Gulian's young blog suddenly become the toast of New Zealand's web fraternity.

He admits he didn't know quite what he was in for when three years ago he and his partner bought the 20-acre property, which boasts an olive grove and a small paddock hugging the banks of the Huangarua River.

"I remember the real estate agent called and said the vendor wanted to know if we wanted a tractor as well. We said no thanks, we won't be needing it. It wasn't until we got here that we took look around and thought, oh.... we need a tractor - or things are going to get out of control."

Neighbours quickly came to the rescue of the self-confessed city boy, who had to be shown how to look after the wide gamut of trees he now owned.

"A neighbour took me through the grove and began to rattle off instructions, while I was scribbling away furiously on a notepad. I'm from suburban Detroit, which is just suburb after suburb, four-lane roads and strip malls. You could say I'm in a totally different environment here."

But, after three years of mucking in and a serious crash-course in life styling, things are now running a bit more smoothly.

"I'm still learning, and every weekend there's always much to do. But rather than looking at everything that needs doing, we focus on one thing at a time - otherwise we'd lose our minds."

Adapting to life in the country has provided a bounty of humorous tales for Mr Gulian, who decided a blog would be the perfect way to share them.

"I've told a few stories to friends over lunch and they said 'you've just got to put them on a blog'. So I did."

His blog Moon Over Martinborough - a name inspired by bright nights in the olive grove - attracted just a dozen page views in the first month.

Now it's getting about 2700 hits each month, from fellow bloggers and budding olive growers across the world.

He's written about being stranded in Martinborough by raging rivers, conquering the Rimutaka Hill Road in a tiny Nissan Pulsar and getting spooked by a vicious "bat" in the chook house that later just turned out to be a harmless sparrow.

Being named Netguide's site of the month came as a "total surprise".

"I had no idea. As soon as I found out I bought five copies and sent them overseas. They gave me a great review... I was completely stoked."

The magazine declared: "Moon Over Martinborough has one thing that so many blogs lack - it's very well written - and it's quite easy to waste an afternoon reading stories of flooding rivers, disobedient sheep, and of course, what it takes to get an olive grove up and running, starting without the slightest bit of knowledge as to how it's done.

"Simultaneously witty and affecting, Moon Over Martinborough is a pleasant surprise in the blogosphere: inherently readable posts that, when put together, wouldn't look out of place on the shelf of a good bookstore."

• People can visit the blog at www.moonovermartinborough.com.