1 Proudly brought to you by... Tonight on Sunday, the shameful state of our waterways. It's gonna take a lot for this river to recover. Sad. Really sad. Really, really sad. Why is that some of the water falling on the Southern Alps by the time it gets to the sea is both undrinkable and unswimmable? Is the river dying? Oh, I definitely think it is, and it's probably the first of many in New Zealand unless we start changing our attitude. Tonight we travel the Selwyn... Here's the river. Where's it gone? ...in search of answers. It's nothing to do with dairy farmers taking too much out of the aquifers around here? Yes, there is an effect of` of those takes. How many cows do you think is too many cows for Canterbury? Oh, well, I think any cows on the Canterbury Plains is bad news. And there's Uncle Jim. That's in the days when there were plenty of eels about. Memories of my childhood. When I was kid, eeling was a time-honoured tradition in my family. But when the sun rises tomorrow we won't have any eels. Now pollution is poisoning my family's traditions. So people could die getting in that lake? They could. What will our children inherit? It's such a history here. Not just for my children but for so many people who brought their children up out here. If I want to eat meat then at least I should kill it myself. Want to eat? Then kill your own. Even just touching meat is very, very strange if you never touched it. Meet the devoted couple who have stripped life to the basics. So this a little pig that I saw last week. It's all natural things. Women have done` have lived like this for thousands of years. What do you think of the way we live our lives? I don't really know how you can stand it. (LAUGHS) www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2017 Kia ora. I'm Miriama Kamo. Where do you like to swim, to fish, to kayak, to take your family? Can you still safely do those things? Well, tonight we take you to Canterbury to look at two waterways that are so toxic, some say they're dying. But is it because of irrigation, dairy farming or climate change? And most importantly, can we save them? Well, later I'll take you to my family bach beside Wairewa or Lake Forsyth, but first here's John Hudson on the Selwyn River. (MAJESTIC MUSIC) There's a special place in New Zealand where moisture hits the Southern Alps, creating one of the most beautiful panoramas on Earth. It's the jewel in our crown. Most of the rain and snow ends up cascading down the West Coast and into the glorious high country lakes. Much less water makes it to the Eastern Plains. With New Zealand's climate warming, the trend is being amplified. A wetter west and a dryer, more drought-prone east. For the people who rely on this water, the trend means trouble. What's not to like about the Southern Alps? Magnificent mountains, pure air and pristine drinkable water. So why is it that some the water falling on the Southern Alps by the time it gets to the sea is both undrinkable and unswimmable? For water scientists, the Selwyn River represents the canary in the coal mine. It starts out like this... and ends up like this, where the locals are warned not to drink the water. (TENSE MUSIC) Nobody's supposed to swim here either ` it's dangerous. They probably shouldn't, no. (CHUCKLES) But they do anyway? They do, but then they have to come in and have a shower and all their clothes have to be washed, and you can't wash it with your normal clothes cos it just stinks. Erin Coffey and her boys live near the river mouth. She's seen a marked decline in both water volume and quality. Is the river dying? Oh, I definitely think it is, yeah. Yeah, and it's probably the first of many in New Zealand unless we start changing our attitudes. It's a disaster. We can't let the kids go for a paddle in. We're frightened to let the dogs go cos if they drink it, they'll die. I mean to say, that's Third World country, isn't it? It's not` It's not New Zealand. Russ Duckworth began fishing the Selwyn River more than 80 years ago. It was recognised in its day as the best mile and a half of trout fishing the world. Tourists travelled the globe to fish the Selwyn, including in 1927 a future king, George VI. There were fish everywhere. Fish in the lake, fish in the river. And today, you know, there's nobody here. Inland is Coes Ford, a spot where generations of children swam each summer. Not anymore. This summer the river stopped flowing here. Locals like Shannon Bray tried to save fish from the remaining weed-filled ponds. 3000 last weekend, and there's still a lot dead and dying. A lot of eels. A lot of native fish as well. Yeah. A lot of bullies. Yeah. But, um, yeah, it's gonna take a lot for this river to recover. Sad. Really sad. Really, really sad, yeah. So where has the water gone? And why is what is left full of weed? In search of the answers, I drove further inland to one of the tributaries of the Selwyn near Whitecliffs. I'm in the foothills of the Southern Alps and this is the Selwyn River. There's a bit of farmland around here, but it's flowing nicely and the water is clear. There's a bit of weed on the bottom. What I'm hoping to find out is where does this water go to? Why isn't it getting to the sea? So that's not a bad flow in there. Yeah, there's plenty of water there, isn't there? What would you say? A couple of metres a second? It would be 1.5m3 here, I'd say, at a rough guess. Fresh water ecologist Dr Mike Joy grew up in Selwyn. As a child, he swam in this river. You know, I grew up thinking I was so fortunate to live in this clean green country where you could just go and swim in any river, and we've lost all that, for the sake of what, I'm not sure. Now he's back to test it. Looks pretty to clear to me, Mike. Yeah. Yeah, that's nice clean water, isn't it? Nice and clear. Plenty of clarity there. No worries. Would you drink it, though? Oh, I'm not sure that I'd drink it, no. No. Not down here. Yeah. We'll see. We'll see what it's got in it, eh? Well, it turns out the water here is pretty good. The lab tests showed it has acceptable levels of nitrate and E.coli. As you travel down onto the Canterbury Plains, the water from the Upper Selwyn disappears underground. In summer that's the way its always been. And on either side of the dry riverbed, 1700 irrigators are pumping underground water onto farms. In theory no one owns this water, but Selwyn farmers have water allocations totalling nearly half a billion cubic metres a year. Over the past 12 years, the number of dairy cows being farmed here in the Selwyn District has doubled. And that's been possible because of one thing ` water. But the water rights in Selwyn have been over-allocated. Some underground reserves are running low and there are now water restrictions. Until we get eight inches of rain in oldspeak or a foot of snow or something like that, we are not going to get the recharge and we're not going to see it flowing. John Sunckell is a third generation Selwyn dairy farmer. He's also a board member of Environment Canterbury, the people responsible for allocating water rights. It's nothing to do with dairy farmers taking too much out of the aquifers around here? Yes, there is an effect of` of` of those takes, and they're estimated around 15% or 20%. But the major driver is` is climate. What those guys are finding over the last two years ` those that have got irrigation water and deep wells ` that reliability's gone or going just because of climate. So two things, really, is it? Two things. Major driver climate, and an effect from the` the extraction of water for irrigation. So, Mike, we're now 46Ks downriver from Whitecliffs where we were before, and here's the river. Where's it gone? Yeah, well, this is all that's left of it, and it's only because they dug a hole for it here. At Chamberlains Ford the water table has fallen. There's not enough spring water to swim. But this has happened before. The time that it disappears for is getting longer and longer every year. So climate change, water table being sucked down by the irrigators and there's less water here, so down it goes. The weed has gone wild. Well, this is what happens when you concentrate all the nutrients into one spot. You haven't got the flow to flush it out and this is` this is what you get. It's a soup. Let's see if it's a swimmable soup. The soup fed by nitrogen run-off from the farms is potentially toxic. I don't like the look of this. I think I'll pop my gloves on. You wouldn't drink it? No. (CHUCKLES) Would you swim in it, though? I'd have to be pretty desperate. This water has low levels of E. coli, but the fish-killing nitrate is very high ` 70 times more than the Whitecliffs water we saw earlier, way above acceptable levels. So why is that? After the break... the pee epidemic. Basically what you're doing here is just pumping up the system full of nitrogen to flow downstream. Have we reached peak dairy in this region? 1 Low rainfall, high temperatures, coarse soils and strong winds mean 70% of New Zealand's irrigation occurs in Canterbury. We've had three years of droughts. The last decent flow we had through was in the autumn of 2014. Here it takes more than 2000L of water to produce just one litre of milk. That's about twice the global average. And in many places the water table is now very low, so farmers want new sources of water. It does need to be solved. We cannot continue in the manner that we are. Irrigation and fertiliser are driving farm productivity. For rivers like the Selwyn, the lack of water isn't the only problem. The nitrogen, which has gone up somewhere round 600-800% in the last 20 years, you know, that isn't doing anything but making more mess. Nitrogen in fertiliser makes the grass grow ` grass eaten by cows, which pass most of the nitrogen in urine and faeces onto the porous Selwyn soils, which then leeches down into groundwater or surface streams. We know that some of it comes off dairy farms, and arable farming is increasingly finding that they have a part to play as well. So it's not just dairy farms. It's the whole catchment. Everyone that's involved has a part to play. Have we reached peak dairy in this region? Very close. We may not have seen the end of the expansion, but the gold rush has gone. Canterbury's the place we've really gone hard on the intensification on soils that really shouldn't have cows on them. So here's where we get the first really bad hints of` of what will happen to the rest of the country if we don't do something about it. Many Selwyn farmers are doing something about it. The majority of those farms have their drains fenced. Riparian planting's happening. We're aware of it. We're working on it. But is it enough? Can the Selwyn be saved? Can the water quality be improved? A few years ago a group of farmers formed a company to provide an alternative water supply. It takes water from Lake Coleridge down the Rakia River and out through a 17km-long canal into the Selwyn Catchment, providing those who buy into the scheme with reliable pristine irrigation, weaning them off the deep water aquifers. We need some stability and guarantees, and this scheme provides that. It's expensive if you have to change over, isn't it? It is exciting news and it is expensive to change over. And it doesn't solve a fundamental problem. It's gonna get used to grow grass, which is gonna be eaten by cows, and they're going to convert the nitrogen. A little bit's gonna go to the` to the milk, and the rest of it's gonna go down into the ground. Now there's talk of taking some of this canal water to augment the Selwyn River. Run it out through cobbles, let it infiltrate into the system, and then we have Chamberlains Ford, Coes Ford running. It's just more of the same to the system, so it's not gonna be` it's not gonna be a good thing for it. Taxpayers chipped in for part of this irrigation canal, and now they're being asked to pay for extra water. These guys should be paying for the damage that they're doing. The people who are making the money aren't paying the cost. The rest of the society are paying the cost. And do you think generally that polluters should pay for the damage that there is done to the environment? Generally, yes. But then whose pollution are we paying for? Who is responsible? Dr Joy thinks a good solution would be to tax fertiliser. Yeah, because that's what's costing in the end. It would mean, he says, far fewer cows per hectare. And then you wouldn't have the nitrogen problem anymore. How many cows do you think is too many cows for Canterbury? I think any cows on the Canterbury Plains is` is bad news, and I'm not the only one who's said that. What's intriguing here is the economics. You can drink water straight from the lake for nothing, but even in New Zealand a litre of pristine bottled lake water is more expensive than a litre of milk. And yet here in Selwyn they're using more than 2000L of that Lake Coleridge water to produce each litre of milk. If we start having, you know, real true cost economics and started working out how much this is costing society, then we would never do it in the first place. What do you reckon the best way to make milk is then? I reckon that you cut out the cow. The markets are really growing for plant-based milk. What response do you get from farmers when you tell them this ` that what they're doing is in the long term not sustainable? Well, I mean, some farmers totally get it and they know what's going on. But for most of the other ones that I talk to, they get such a rosy view of what is going on and what's happening. They don't know that they could have less cows and make more money. Just a few kilometres down the river and we're back at Coes Ford,... Good luck in there. ...the old swimming hole which is now a puddle, and you need to scrape off the duck weed to get to the water. That's a nice murky one, isn't it? Yeah. Doesn't quite look the same as the others, does it? The lab results show the nitrate in this water sample is double the level near the headwaters at Whitecliffs, and the elevated E. coli means that it would not be swimmable even if there was enough water to do so. So exactly where does the groundwater spring back into the Selwyn? Well, fish rescuer Shannon Bray knew, and it meant a drive even further down the riverbed. Normally the water would come into the river, what, 20km further up? Yeah. So that's how much you've lost this summer. Yeah, it's, um` It's not good. Closer to sea level at Selwyn Huts, the place once world-renowned for its trout fishing, the water is deeper, full of weed and stagnant. Perhaps surprisingly, though, our sample shows relatively low levels of both nitrate and E. coli, meaning the water is swimmable. But the trout have decided otherwise. I'm angry and pissed off, quite frankly, to think that we've let this thing get to the stage that kids can't swim in the river. They can't enjoy the boating. Fishing is a bypass. They can't have picnics. All those things which we had were very important in our lives. It's just gone. My journey down the Selwyn River has come to an end. Remember that pristine mountain water we showed you earlier? Well, here it's turned into a green, potentially toxic sludge where the Selwyn meets Lake Elsmere, one of the most polluted lakes in the country. The people here are not happy. They are hoping that this is not the end of the Selwyn River. So what do you think? Will it be the end of the Selwyn River? Go to our Sunday Facebook page and tell us what you reckon should be done to save the river. Now, just across from where John was standing at Lake Elsmere is a lake very special to me. Next I take you to Wairewa or Lake Forsyth, where generations of my family have grown up, and I want to tell you how a severe algal bloom is threatening the traditions that my family hold dear. This is just like what Mummy used to do when I was your age. We'd put our warm clothes on and head down to the lake with our torches. And we were just one of many eeling families. If someone fell in and ingested probably 5ml of the Nodularia blue-green algae, they'd have liver trouble, and possibly if they ingested enough, it could, you know, cause death. So people could die getting in that lake? They could. 1 Welcome back. Wairewa or Lake Forsyth is so polluted, some say it's not only dying ` it's already dead. It's where my family have had a bach for generations. We caught eels, known in Maori as 'tuna'. Well, tonight I want to take you there to find out how the pollution got so bad and whether there's any hope for turning around a poisoned waterway. (PEACEFUL MUSIC) We're gonna need this torch for our night-time adventure. When I was kid... Now let's turn it on, Mummy, and see if it works, eh? ...eeling was a time-honoured tradition in my family. This is just like what Mummy used to do when I was your age. We'd put our warm clothes on and head down to the lake with our torches. Crunching stones underfoot, the whipping wind, flashing torches ` a special time, but not unique. Generations had gone before and we were just one of many eeling families. Do you remember this, Mum? We'd lie on the stones and you'd tell us stories, and we'd look at the beautiful stars, and it was very magical. Everybody else was catching eels and if we talked too loudly they'd say, 'Shh! Quiet!' Can you imagine that? But when the sun rises tomorrow, we won't have any eels. In fact there's no telling when we'll feel safe to have eels at daybreak ever again. (TENSE MUSIC) This is Wairewa, or Lake Forsyth today. It may look benign... but it's poisoned and poisonous, rife with blue-green algae. If someone fell in and ingested probably 5ml of the Nodularia blue-green algae, they'd have liver trouble, and possibly if they ingested enough, it could, you know, cause death. So people could die getting in that lake? They could. Iaean Cranwell is a Ngai Tahu tangata tiaka or guardian of Wairewa and a counsellor with Environment Canterbury, which controls the lake with DOC, MPI and Christchurch City Council. But Iaean's runanga, Wairewa, feel the weight of responsibility. Is this lake dying? This` This is who we are, this lake. If this lake dies, you know, us as tangata tiaki, us as kai tiaki ` we haven't done our job. This is the lake at its worst. Green sludge. Dying eels. But to truly understand the worst of times, you have to understand the best. Masses of migrating eels made Wairewa an important and famous food basket for local Maori. The custom my family follow of mahinga kai ` the gathering and sharing of traditional foods ` was set over hundreds of years. There's Uncle Jim. That's in the days when there were plenty of eels about. My dad Raynol first brought my mum Mary out to the lake when she was just 20 years old. Woo, look at that one! Racy lady outside the old bach. And Mum's wanted to protect it ever since. What's this? This is the story of you becoming a bit of an activist on the lakefront. Yeah. 1983. It was 1983. You remember the wee dog, Goldie? Yeah. So the first sign for us as a family that something was seriously wrong on this lake was about 30-odd years ago. We took the dinghy out and we had our dog Goldie with us in the boat. She jumped out and had a bit of a swim, and when we got back to shore, she was completely covered in some green stuff. We had no idea what it was. We washed her off but a few days later she was dead. I don't think we've got any photos of Goldie. There. Is that not her? That's` That's Goldie, isn't it? No. Goldie was a little wee thing. Mum rang the local authorities but wasn't thrilled with their lack of urgency. So I phoned them to tell them what had happened and he said, 'Oh, it's only dangerous to mammals.' (LAUGHTER) To what? Maoris? Don't worry` No, Dad. (CHUCKLES) Mammals. Only dangerous to Maoris (!) (LAUGHTER) You'd have been in big trouble then, eh, Dad? (LAUGHTER) But what bothered me was there were no warning signs. But you got your sign. Got the sign, yeah. One sign. (CHUCKLES) So I was not impressed. Mum's small sign on the road into Birdlings Flat is long gone. But now there's a big flash sign right by the water warning of the dangers. We've had, you know, stock, sheep, cows, family pets, etc. die from ingesting the water from the lake. How bad is it right now? I mean, is this the worst that it's ever been? In March last year it was worse. That's the first time that I've ever seen it affect the lake through the whole year. And in talking to our kaumatua, it's the first time for them as well. So what caused these problems? Well, unlike the Selwyn River, afflicted by nitrates, Wairewa's pollution is caused mainly by phosphorus from volcanic soil when the hills were stripped of trees to help build Christchurch and make way for farms. It's a legacy issue. When the lake was deforested 160 years ago or so, you know, when you cut the trees down and it rains, where does all the sediment go? It'll go down to the rivers and into the lake. So we might have in some areas 1m to 1.5m of phosphorus sludge on the bottom of our lake. (SOMBRE MUSIC) In fact, things have become so chronic that the day before we filmed, a rahui was put on the lake ` an unprecedented action banning people from taking any eels, any tuna, in essence putting a stop to mahinga kai. The tuna is who we are here. To not have a season is` it makes the` the heart cry. Our tipuna would be turning. (RELAXED GUITAR MUSIC) So this is` These are your gaffs here, Charlie. These are pretty flash. Yeah, but that's the` what they call space age technology. (CHUCKLES) Cos we used to have wooden ones. Charlie Zimmerman is, like Iaean, a tangata tiaki of the lake. Every day he patrols these drains, dug by eelers to catch tuna as they migrate to the sea. Charlie is keen to keep the old ways alive, but it's a challenge with a rahui in place. That kind of boggles the brain, really, because for me, uh, Wairewa and Birdlings has always been about the eeling. I know it'll upset a lot of eelers, but it's what we need to do to, um, keep people safe from going ahead and helping themselves. Will you miss eeling? Oh, for sure. For sure. You know, this is the second year in a row that I haven't taken eels. My freezer's getting a little bit slim. So if it's polluted, dying, dead, is that the end or is there hope? There are some who say that Wairewa could in fact serve as the model for how to transform and save a poisoned and dying waterway. You know, we've seen a lot of people talk the talk, but we thought, nah, we're gonna walk the walk. You know, we've probably put in over $1 million into this project, uh, but we're not finished. What we have done we believe is unique in Aotearoa ` in New Zealand. Their solution? Bioengineering, including this canal allowing them to open and flush the lake. And two years ago things were looking good. Aquatic plant life was flourishing. But then a flood brought down even more sediment. The question now ` whether to dredge. It's the only way of getting rid of the phosphorus. There's a $100 million freshwater fund out there at the moment. We only need $20 million. So how realistic is that, then? Well, I mean, maybe you can do bits over time. If you didn't do anything, how close to death is this lake? Um, we had one scientists say, 'Well, it's` with all coastal lakes, 'it'll eventually, you know, get so shallow and then it'll just turn into kind of a swampy anyway.' But it was like, nah, nah, nah. We don't want that. We don't want that legacy on us. We need to fence all the streams, um, fence off the rivers and plant. We want it swimmable but we probably want it more than that. We want a new standard called mahika kai. How do you feel when you stand here and look at the lake? I love it. Yeah. When you're laying down on the shingle, um, when you go eeling, you can imagine your tipuna being here and doing the same thing. Nothing's changed. If you can't put food on` food on the plate to feed your whanau, I mean, what's the point? (SOMBRE MUSIC) For me it's important our kaumatuas are looked after ` our visitors or manuhiri ` that they do go away with a feed. So where'd you dig this up from? Uh, out of my freezer. (CHUCKLES) This is like gold. You wouldn't want to be eating that any time soon. Uh... You just ration it out. Bit at a time. Bit at a time. Yeah. (CHUCKLES) Exactly. I keep getting whiffs of my childhood. I remember walking through the whata, through the drying racks with all the eels hanging down. Oh, it was so cool. It's good having those memories. It is, yeah. The hope is Wairewa's traditions don't become just that ` memories. You used to see eels coming from the lake to the ocean? From the lake, yes. Really? Yes. It was like two black ropes stretching right across. And I ran back to the old bach and told all the guys, and they all jumped up and grabbed their gaffs and headed out. (LAUGHS) Really? Totally took advantage of the eel migration. Absolutely. I thought you were gonna say they all were like, 'Oh my gosh, let's go and see.' No, no, no. Instead they grabbed their gaffs. I sometimes wonder if Te Rerehua, when she has her own children ` if there are gonna be eels in that lake, if there's gonna be a lake even to visit. That would be my hope. So why are these waterways important? Well, they sustain us. The lakes and rivers represent our way of life, the memories we make, the traditions we hold dear and hope to pass on to our children and theirs. We just keep doing it, Dad. Remember? We don't give up. And if we can't keep them alive... Oh, it would break my heart, Miriama. We've got such a history here. Not just for my children but for so many people who brought their children up out here. You've gotta have hope. Absolutely. (SOMBRE MUSIC) Oh, man, I love it there. Well, tomorrow the lake will be opened to the sea to allow the eels to begin their migration, and of course, the rahui remains in place. Down the track Ngai Tahu hopes to gain ownership of the lakebed from DOC. After the break, the story of the Kiwi couple who've spent years camping deep in the bush, offline and off the grid, and the unexpected challenges of life in the wild. The way we live is obviously quite rare, but it's possible cos we do it. You know, in other cultures like the Inuits, they use morning urine to` (LAUGHS) to wash their hair with. So I peed in an empty tin and I poured that over my head and it helped. Was that disgusting? Well, it was my own urine. (LAUGHS) Welcome back. Anyone who's done a bit of hiking knows how hard it is to plan for a few days off the grid ` the questions of shelter, how much food to take and what clothing you'll need. Imagine living your entire life that way. Dutch-born Miriam Lancewood and her Kiwi husband Peter have spent the past six years living months at a time in the wild ` remote locations where they have no communication, minimal food and just a tent. Mark Crysell tracked them down in the middle of the North Island. To really go off the grid,... We don't have a house to come back to. ...you need hit the road. So it's not like, 'Oh, let's go home.' Leave it all behind. We can't, right? And that's just the start of the journey. How far do we have to go? It shouldn't be more than an hour. Up the creek. This isn't the way most people live their lives. It's not normally the way they go home after picking up the groceries. No, that's right. Through the real koru lounge... A lot of the places are not easy for us to get to. ...and you've arrived. That's our camp... Very nice. ...where we've been for several weeks. They're not broke, nor are they on some kind of camping holiday. Dinner's all ready. Tea. Even better. For the past six years, Miriam and Peter have chosen to live as far away as possible from the rest of us, learning to live off the land and fend for themselves. We were both longing for the wilderness and natural places. I think there's many different ways people could live in the 21st century. The way we live is obviously quite rare, but it's possible, cos we do it. Miriam's from Holland, one of the flattest and most crowded countries on Earth. I think I was a much more nervous person when I lived in Holland. When the speed is so much faster, and all those exams in school and universities. Yeah, I was quite nervous. I used to bite my nails. (LAUGHS) Peter's a Kiwi. They met in India around 10 years ago. He was looking after a little nature reserve and he was telling me about the beautiful place and actually the very next day I moved in with him. That quick? That quick. (LAUGHS) I like to take risks. And was Miriam a risk? (LAUGHS) Definitely. Definitely. No. Well, you think about it, if you've got someone 30 years younger, that's a risky person to get in a relationship with in a sense of always trying to keep up, you know? Miriam was school teaching in the South Island when they decided to leave the material world behind. Her principal was horrified. She asked me what I was going to do when I had a period. (LAUGHS) Yeah, and I had a good laugh about that one. Of course we just wash in the river and we just deal with everything. It's all natural things, you know. Women have done` have lived like this for thousands of years. But living in nature can have its challenges when it comes to bathing. In my first winter I suffered from dandruff. Peter said, you know, in other cultures like the Inuits, they use morning urine to` (LAUGHS) to wash their hair with. So I peed in an empty tin and I put it over my head and it helped. Was that disgusting? Well, it was my own urine. (LAUGHS) It's still urine. Yeah, it was very stinky, yeah. So after the urine treatment I, um` I washed it with soap and that was all right. Every day is about problem-solving and surviving, with no power or even a solid roof over their heads. I think having skills is definitely a good thing to have. Why? In case. Well, just in case. In case of what? Pandemic. Imagine how quickly a super pandemic is spread round the world. This is the place you want to be when that happens. It just gives confidence that you can survive if it's` if something happens, whatever that is. Even a power cut. I wouldn't` wouldn't say we're survivalists in that` that we think it's imminent. It's more like I think it's a potential. Their first foray in the wilderness was tough ` very tough. They'd headed off up into the South Marlborough mountains in the late autumn, carrying the absolute basics. The first winter, eh. Yeah, that was very cold and then wet and very uncomfortable and very boring. Yeah, many adjustment we had to go through, didn't we? We'd been working towards something and then we were there, and we had no future. Yeah, and then what? Then what? What happens now? No plans to go anywhere. We're here and nothing happens. So we are in the wilderness, we finally made it, and then what? What are you going to do next day? And the next day, and the next day. Yeah. It was also bitterly, bitterly cold. I got so cold that I started losing weight and lost appetite. I used` used to wake up at 3 o'clock in the morning cold, and then I'd just lie there waiting for the night to be over. That was the time before we had meat and we were just eating lentils and rice, and waking up so hungry our stomach was hurting, wasn't it? Miriam had grown up vegetarian, but to survive in her new life she would have to learn to kill and eat meat. This is the little horn of the first goat that I shot with my bow and arrow. So this is my first kill. I think it's ethically quite a good point that if I want to eat meat then at least I should kill it myself. But it was very difficult. (GUNSHOT) Even just touching meat is very, very strange if you never touched it. You know, it's nothing like carrots. (LAUGHS) Miriam's clearly much more comfortable now as the chief food gatherer. The crossbow's been replaced by a rifle and a knife. Tonight we have wild pork. This is a little pig I saw last week. And Peter made this delicious curry. Do you feel bad about killing a little pig? Yes. I feel bad about every, um, animal really, um, but I do really love to eat them. (LAUGHS) This is the bone marrow. Fresh fruit and veggies are harder to find out in the wild. Bye. So every couple of weeks Miriam sticks her thumb out and hitches to the nearest town. Quite overwhelming ` all the noise, all the buses and cars. And all the people, and... (LAUGHS) (SINGS) She busks for cash, then spends the money she makes at the supermarket. We've got some flour to bake bread. We've got a bit of butter and` Carrots. Broccoli. Carrots, yeah. Some fruit. Tomatoes. What do you miss the most? I think it would be fruit. Yeah. We sometimes eat Vitamin C tablets, but we have to wait for autumn to get the` the berries in the bush. It costs Peter and Miriam around $5000 a year to live like this ` way below the poverty line. Not much is thrown away. Everything has a purpose. This is my` my possum jacket, and I've used all the` the animal skins to put that on into this jacket. And I've made duvets and a mat as well to sleep on, which is incredibly warm. There's always something to do, even if it's just sitting and thinking,... or writing to her sister in Holland. 'Dearest Sophie, can you imagine a way of life so quiet, so timeless, so abundant and full 'that watching a single leaf fluttering from the tree, lifted into the air by a little breeze, 'turning silver in the sunshine is meaningful?' What do you think of the way we live our lives? Um, I don't really know how you can stand it. (LAUGHS) How can you deal with, um, sleep deprivation? And be so tired, and yet all these things and so much pressure. And how do you deal with that without becoming so dull? How can you keep, um, clarity? How can you keep vital? And` And have to go through, and` and how do you deal with monotone existence ` every day the same? The alarm clock. The running around the clock. How do you deal with it? I have no idea. (LAUGHS) No cell phones, no coverage, TV, radio or Internet. It can be easy to forget the outside world exists. Well, almost. So when the earthquake happened in Christchurch,... we knew that` um, we knew that because the airplanes stopped flying. Cos were in the main line that runs, sort of, Auckland-Christchurch, and suddenly no jets. Something's happened. We didn't know whether it was a terrorist attack in Auckland or what it was really, but we knew something happened. And the Pike River mine ` we actually heard that explosion. We were miles away but we heard it in the chimney. A huge roar. It was like, 'What on Earth was that? We thought it was some explosion. No idea. Case in point ` at exactly the same time we were doing this interview, Prime Minister John Key resigned. For me this feels the right time to go. We didn't find out for two days. As soon as I go out into the outside world I spend all my time reading newspapers, watching all the TV channels, YouTube. Ultimately the human world doesn't change much. It's like a rhythm. They've lived in mountains, by beaches, in the bush and tramped the length of the country ` 10 months of walking which pushed them to the absolute limit of physical endurance. So we went up into the Tararuas and there was the last section of, uh, Te Araroa North Island. On the top of the mountains we found ourselves in a big storm. More rain and` and wind and hail. That's when I learnt how to endure. We had absolutely no option but to endure. Enduring has its limits. The age difference between Peter and Miriam is 30 years, but the bond is strong. They couldn't do it alone. He's a little bit the brain and I'm a little bit the body, and so together we are very strong. Peter is 63 now. It's an age when creature comforts become more attractive. Do you worry about getting older and living in the bush like this, though? Um, I could see that one day comes when the physical body can't do it, but until that time, I don't have a problem with it. But at times recurring malaria from his travels in the tropics have made him very sick. What will you do when he gets to the point where he can't physically live out here anymore? Um, we have to find a-a way to deal with it. What will you do if he can't pick up his pack and carry it and keep up with you? Then I'll carry it for him. I'll carry him. (LAUGHS) How much longer can they carry on? Miriam has written a book about their experiences and it's been picked up by publishers in New Zealand and Europe. (SPEAKS DUTCH) Miriam Lancewood. (APPLAUSE) She's been back in Holland on the publicity trail. The tools of her trade can make the locals a bit jumpy. (SPEAKS DUTCH) (LAUGHTER) But can they still stay off the grid if light is now shining into their lives? See, I don't know what lays in front of me, right, but I should be preparing myself. Peter and I will travel. We'll do all sorts of things. You know, we like to go through open doors, so if there is some opportunity to go somewhere, we take it. And Miriam's book Woman in the Wilderness comes out in New Zealand this week. Next, developments on our story about Ashley Peacock, a severely autistic and mentally ill man who's lived for years in a secure mental health unit in Porirua Hospital. Also we look ahead to next week's story about this remarkable woman. She leaves such an impression on people that meet her. From Canterbury farm girl... I mean, she loved life. She enjoyed people's company. ...to Catholic nun. Did you think about what you were giving up? I didn't really think about it, no. I just knew I had to go, so I went. (DRAMATIC MUSIC) 1 You'll remember our story about Ashley Peacock, one of New Zealand's most challenging mental health patients. Detained for over a decade in a psychiatric unit, he spent much of that time locked in a seclusion room. Last year Janet McIntyre met Ashley. Would you rather be outside here or in your room? I'd rather be... in the wilds. (CHUCKLES) For 10 years this has been Ashley's home ` inside the securely enclosed Tawhirimatea Unit at Porirua Hospital. Closer to prison. He was in this little 10m2 room for all but 30 minutes a day uh, for a three-year period. Nothing to do. Poo on the floor, drink his urine and all of this sort of stuff. No one's saying that it's ideal, but it is actually the best available place for him. How does putting Ashley into seclusion assist his mental condition? It doesn't. What's it like in there? How do you feel about being inside there? It's too constricted. Constricted? How? On your head. What do you think Ashley needs? A quiet environment in a rural setting with a couple of animals. Well, this week David and Marlena Peacock revealed Ashley is to be released into the community later this year. A suitable home will need to be found and staff trained to provide round-the-clock care. Yesterday Ashley turned 39 having spent half his life in psychiatric care. Now a sneak peek at next week's programme. Jehan Casinader meets a remarkable New Zealander who's changing lives far from home. (PIANO MUSIC) The life she has chosen is extraordinary. I certainly couldn't do it. She leaves such an impression on people that meet her. From Canterbury farm girl... I mean, she loved life. She enjoyed people's company. ...to Catholic nun. Did you think about what you were giving up? I didn't really think about it, no. I just knew I had to go, so I went. (DRAMATIC MUSIC) Saving the lives of unwanted children... They've been abandoned by their parents. ...at a Sri Lankan orphanage. No one has ever been allowed to film inside those gates until now. Four decades of sacrifice. Are there times you've doubted God? The family she left behind. There are certainly times when I wish that she was here. And the secret letter from a saint. I never saw it before. You've never seen this before? No. Sister Aroha ` a Sunday exclusive. That story for you next Sunday. And that's our show for tonight. Do join us on Facebook and Twitter ` SundayTVNZ.