But you might prefer to disregard your sense of smell at Feilding's twice-weekly livestock market, held here since 1880.
On Friday mornings, retired farmers conduct tours through the saleyards. One of the guides, Eric, tells us that, with a couple of million dollars of business done here each week when 15,000 sheep and 1400 cattle pass through, the market is the biggest in the country.
Today, because lambing is keeping many farmers away, not all the sheep pens are in use, but there is still plenty of noise, bustle and, yes, a rich country smell in the air. Bidding is brisk and the auctioneers in their leather chaps are busy.
But the buyers still have time for socialising and some traditional moaning about the weather: "Yeah, the dry spell's good, but just a few millimetres of rain and we'll be right back where we started."
Indoors, where the cattle are sold beneath a readout of their weight and price, there's a constant hum from the farmers, uniform in mud-coloured jerseys, stout boots and baseball caps as they sit on the bleachers watching the beasts move through.
Eagle-eyed bid-spotters rake the crowd for understated nods and winks, and Eric warns me not to wave my notebook.
The prices are too rich for me: 13 charolais bullocks knocked down for $1130 each. That's $2 a kilo, the display says bluntly - it's a good thing cattle can't read.
There's no shortage of eateries in the town, but as we blat along the Manawatu River later that afternoon, thumping over astonishingly big waves, I wonder whether that cheesecake at Sage was such a good idea.
There's a strong wind funnelling through the gorge and James, our Hiwinui Jet driver, nearly flagged the trip.
But even though it's a jarring ride, it's exciting and spectacular and we're glad of the chance to see the gorge from this angle. We hadn't realised the road running through it hangs over empty air for much of its length, and drive back to Feilding with extra care.
We spend the night at James' family property, Hiwinui Country Estate, where Jan welcomes us with wine, an apricot friand and a blazing log fire.
It's a magnificent house overlooking 450 green hectares farmed by the Stewarts for 120 years, and we are made supremely comfortable.
"It's my passion to make people feel looked after," says Jan, and as many guests never get out of their snuggly robes during their stay, it's clear that she succeeds.
Clare, the on-site beauty therapist - with her arsenal of oils and unguents from the Herb Farm along the road, and her hot river-stones - is an essential part of the relaxation process, although Dave Stewart, the original Hiwinui Stud (he has the polo shirt to prove it) will take massage-wary men on a tour of the prize-winning romney and poll dorset flocks or arrange a fly-fishing trip.
After a slow breakfast gazing out at the ducks and geese on the pond and the leisurely turning vanes of the windmills along the Ruahine Ranges, we reluctantly drive away to discover more of Manawatu's delights.
At Himatangi Beach, the dunes disappear into the sea-haze north and south, and the little Kaikokopu Stream is lined with hopeful whitebaiters.
Some of them are wading slowly upstream, swishing a long stick through the water to drive the fry into their nets. But one woman tells us: "I have no idea what I'm doing. I can't see a thing. Even in a bucket, the whitebait are difficult to spot - especially when there are only three of them."
A more optimistic whitebaiter, a man in gumboots and a woollen beanie, says: "Only half a fritter's worth so far - but the tide's turning soon.
"I got half a pound here one day last season," he tells us, twice.
He also says you can buy enough for a feed at Woolworths for $9, so we know, one way or another, what he'll be having for tea.
At Foxton there's another windmill, solid and traditional, where Jan, a lugubrious Dutchman, shows how creaking sails power the wooden wheels and cogs that turn the millstones, grinding the flour he sells.
From here there's a good view of the wide main street lined with ambitiously grand buildings, built in 1920 after a disastrous fire.
This town is reinventing itself with the windmill, museums and murals illustrating the town's lively past when the flax-stripping and woolsack factories employed many people.
Historian Dave is an enthusiastic guide around the exhibits in the old Court House.
We are just leaving when another Foxtonian comes in to check on reports that the museum is getting tatty, and tells Dave that the presentation could be better.
Looking at Eddie, unshaven and dressed in baggy trackpants and what might once have been slippers, we think maybe he has a few presentation problems of his own. We leave them arguing amiably about corkboards.
That's how it is in the Manawatu - friendly and relaxed on the surface, but the passion is there. You just have to look for it.
CHECKLIST
Getting there: Feilding (voted New Zealand's most beautiful town 12 times) is 20km north of Palmerston North on SH54. Foxton is 30 minutes' drive from Feilding on SH1.
Accommodation: Hiwinui Country Estate is 15 minutes from the centre of Palmerston North, at 465 Ashhurst Bunnythorpe Road. Phone (06) 329 2838. They offer dinner, bed and breakfast plus spa treatments and the Hiwinui Jet for rides along the gorge.
Things to do:
• There are Feilding Farmers' Market and saleyard tours every Friday morning.
• For details about the Foxton Windmill de Molen, phone (06) 363 5601 or email: demolenfoxton@xtra.co.nz
Further information: Call the Feilding Information Centre on (06) 323 3318 or visit feilding.co.nz.
