Heartland - The Catlins

We're only playing at it today — we've only got 550 to do.

– Gavin Landreth discusses the number of sheep that need shearing

In the Catlins, life still revolves around ordinary things — it centers on the family and school, and one of the two social anchors of the district: the church or the pub. Social division is sharp and clear. The locals put it simply — there are the elbowbenders and the kneebenders.

– Presenter Gary McCormick, early in this documentary

They made me shave every day when I was in the army and I swore I would never shave when i come out of it. I think I had a shave the day I got married, and one other time I think, since I've come home.

– Cannibal Bay 74-year-old Eric Michie on his beard

I wouldn't leave here — it's free and easy, and I can please myself . . . No collar and tie stuff with me — it damn near chokes me when I put it on.

– Cannibal Bay local Eric Michie, aged 74

..there was 28 sawmills in the Catlins. Every five miles there'd be a sawmill. And then when it was cut out, they'd just shift along, you know. It was far more people living in the Catlins in the sawmilling era than in the farming era.

– Gary learns about sawmilling at the museum, from Kitty 'Granny' Burgess, near the end of the episode

Well it's a bit of a scarey thought really ... looking after myself —instead of being in little Owaka, my comfort zone. I think that'll be really good for me, to get away from what I've been used to all my life...

– Teenager Deborah Leslie on leaving Owaka to start an AFS student exchange in Finland