NewZ from NewZealand

The End

2008-07-14T12:36:00.000-07:00

This final post has been long overdue, but I wanted to officially end this blog so I figure better late than never. I'm back from my post-New Zealand family vacation to Hawaii and have now been in the US for 3 weeks and officially home for a week. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a strange feeling. After spending almost 5 months in New Zealand, and seeing my friends there literally every day, it's weird to suddenly be back home and know that I won't see most people until school starts back up again in September. But it was an absolutely incredible experience that I wouldn't trade for anything. I just can't believe that it's all over now.

So, how did it all end? Well, we had a very enjoyable last night. It rained literally every single day for the final week, but that didn't stop us. We all faced the rain and went out to dinner at the Waterfront, down in the Viaduct. (Since we didn't totally dry out during dinner and it was quite cold, we kind of wimped out and decided to take a cab back!). Then, we went out for one last night out, trying to make the most of our last 24 hours.

Here's a group shot at dinner:

And here's one of Cate and I:
Sunday morning we got up early so as not to waste what little time we had left. We did a little more packing and then a group of us decided to go get a final kebab on Queen St. (Another group of people decided to really go out with a bang and went bungy jumping off the Auckland Harbor Bridge that morning!) We headed back to Empire to shower and finalize all of the packing, but Cate and I were done with plenty of time to spare. We were literally sitting in our empty rooms, which was way too depressing, so we decided to go upstairs and watch Rich and Nick finish packing!

We had arranged for 2 Super Shuttles to come pick us up at 4:30 PM. We met downstairs and said our goodbyes to non-Loyola roommates and Australearn kids. This was when it was really starting to sink in that we were actually leaving, never to live in Empire Apartments again. At the airport, the line was moving pretty slow. We went up to the counter in groups of 3 or 4 so that we could sit next to each other. I was sitting with Cate and Nick and we lucked out with our luggage - our combined weight just made the cut so we didn't have to pay any overage charges. By the time we got to the gate and everything, we didn't have long to wait before we boarded.

The flight went by surprisingly fast. Luckily I was able to sleep for a good portion of the flight - I'd guess I got in about 6 hours of sleep. So I wasn't feeling too bad when we arrived in San Francisco for our 9 hour layover. We weren't about to spend 9 hours just sitting in an airport when we had just come off of a 12 hour flight and still had another 6 hour one to go. So most of us took the BART train and headed downtown to check out San Francisco.

We were quite a sight, a group of 12 of us walking around with all of our carry-on luggage. We walked along the water, past Fisherman's Wharf, and got lunch at In-and-Out burger, at Ed's suggestion. After lunch, we went to Ghiradelli Square before riding a trolley back to the BART station. I was definitely very glad that we got to actually do something during our layover - it made the time pass much more quickly.

We could just see the Golden Gate Bridge through the fog:

The flight from SFO to JFK seemed much long than the one from Auckland to SFO, even though in reality it took about half the time. Once we landed, everyone except for me and a few others were reunited with their families. I was among the few whose parents were not at the airport (I was catching a ride home with Cate, and there were several people who still had to take a connecting flight). So, later that day I had my reunion with my family and then had one day to unpack and repack before heading off to Hawaii.

So now, it's been 3 weeks to the day since I've been back in the US. There's been some adjusting to do. (I kept turning on my windshield wipers instead of my blinker the first few days I was back driving. Luckily, I remember to stay on the right side of the road.) I really miss New Zealand, and especially my friends, a lot. It was an incredible, truly once in a lifetime experience, and I am so thankful that it turned out so well. It was everything I could have hoped for it to be - and even more.

I'm still working on going through the almost 5000 pictures I took. (I'm making my parents and sister look at every single one, but I'm in the process of creating a best-of slideshow for everyone else!) Every time I look at pictures, or something else here happens to remind me of New Zealand, I can't help but smile. It was just truly a great 5 months. Never again will this be what I see when I look out of my bedroom window, but it sure was wonderful while it lasted!

Well, thanks to everyone who read this blog! Though tedious to write at times, I'm so happy that I stuck with it. It was a great way to stay connected with people at home and to keep everyone updated on all my adventures (not to mention that this will be a great keepsake for me).

It's been quite an adventure that I know I will never forget. Thanks for sharing it with me! And if you ever have the chance to visit New Zealand, I highly recommend it (if I haven't made that quite obvious by now!).

Love,

Lauren

Good Bye Auckland

2008-06-27T18:10:00.000-07:00

Well, this is it. In a few hours, I'll be leaving Auckland and be on my way back home. This feels completely surreal to me right now. I honestly can not believe that four months have come and gone and it's already time to come home. It's been an absolutely incredible experience and I couldn't have asked for anything more.

I'm planning on writing one last post when I get home, so I won't get too sappy now. Once I'm back in the States, I'll have had time to reflect on this experience and maybe write about that.

This past week has been rather interesting. We didn't do much because everyone had finals. I had one on Monday and then my other 3 all in the past 3 days. It has also rained every single day for the past week. So between the yucky weather and having to study and take tests, I think it's made for a good transition and at least warmed me up to the idea of going home. I'm excited about being home and seeing family and friends, but I'm also incredibly sad about the fact of this whole experience being over. I just can't believe it.

Anyway, I still have some last minute packing to do and a bunch of us are going to take one last walk down Queen St. to get kebabs. So this will have to be all for now.

Good Bye Auckland, I will miss you!

The Many Faces of the Skytower

2008-06-22T00:07:00.000-07:00

Throughout the past four months, I have been doing a little photo study of the Skytower, trying to capture it from different locations, in different types of weather, and at different times of the day. It is THE icon of Auckland, and as I am nearing the end of my time here (just one week left now), I thought this would be a good time to share some of these photos. I know that there are a bunch of photos here, but I took so many, that it was hard to narrow it down. Many of them were just taken right from my bedroom window (like these first 3). Believe it or not, these first 3 pictures were all taken today!

Here's the Skytower in the sun...
...and in the rain. I actually took this today during a sunshower. The weather was so weird today - it was POURING during the night and morning, then it cleared up and was sunny, then it got rainy again, then it started downpouring again, then the sun kind of came out....it was just very strange.
Again, today's weird weather:

Here's the Skytower during the day......and at night. This was while they still lit up the Skytower at night. Now, they've started this new thing where they don't light it up anymore, to conserve electricity. Nice green move, but it was so pretty! (It doesn't look like this at night anymore. Now, the only lights on are a couple of blinking red safety lights for planes.)

Before the energy conservation plan began, the Skytower would sometimes be lit up different colors for different occasions (like the Empire State Building). Here it is in yellow with a lovely crescent moon:
These two pictures were taken from Auckland Domain, one of Auckland's parks:I liked the palm trees!

Pretty much where ever you go in Auckland, you can catch a glimpse of the Skytower. From One Tree Hill...
From Ponsonby...

Down by the Viaduct...

And of course from the water. This was taken on our ferry ride to Waiheke Island:The Skytower never disappears from sight. Unless, of course, it really does disappear! (It has actually gotten this foggy several times.)

But in nicer weather, the tower just looks beautiful against a clear blue sky.

I'm really going to miss just being able to look out my window and see the Skytower in a new light every time. Whether it's at dusk...

...during a beautiful sunset,
... or night time,...I have really loved seeing the Skytower in a new way every day.

Auckland, I will miss you.

Rangitoto Island

2008-06-20T22:31:00.000-07:00

Rangitoto Island is the youngest island in the Hauraki Gulf and was formed by a volcanic eruption about 600 years ago. Today, there are no inhabitants on the island, but it is accessible by ferry and is a common day hike. A group of us (Kelly, Cate, Ed, Lynn, Caitlin and I) decided to take a break from studying and went to visit the island on Thursday. There are several trails on the island and you can hike up to the summit. The terrain on the island was quite rocky, because the ground is still very much made of all the remains of the lava and stuff from when the volcano erupted. Relatively speaking, the island is very new.
We began our hike up to the summit, which took about an hour, including a few picture stops. Some parts were a little steep, especially closer to the summit, but for the most part it was a pretty steady and gradual uphill climb.
The views from the top were definitely worth it! We had 360 degree views of the harbor and back to Auckland. We stayed up at the top just hanging out for a while enjoying the beautiful weather and views. We had packed lunches and ate these up top.
Here's a group shot we took using a self timer. We're kind of blocking the views, but here's Cate, Kelly, Ed, Lynn, myself and Caitlin at the summit:
More views:
You could also walk around the rim of the crater, which only took about 10-15 minutes. I was surprised how much growth and vegetation there was inside of the crater. The shape of it looked as I expected, but I thought that it would be all rocky inside, not full of trees!On our walk back down the volcano, we took a side trail to go visit the lava caves. There are several different caves that are formed out of lava tubes. Some of them are very small, but others were large enough to walk through. It was recommended that you have a flashlight, but we didn't have one with us. They were very dark, but we braved them anyway, going very slow and taking flash photos every so often to get an idea for what lay ahead. It's hard to get a feel for what it was like inside from these pictures, but you can kind of tell that it was a pretty small space. On either end, you still had the light from the entrance or exit, but in the middle it got so dark that you really couldn't even see the person in front of you!

Here we are at the entrance to the lava cave:

It was rather low at some points:

Here are Caitlin, Ed and Kelly emerging at the end:

We got down to the bottom of the hill and still had over an hour before the ferry would be back to pick us up, so we decided to walk along the coast for a little while. It wasn't very "beachy" because the beaches were made of volcanic rock. There were several historic beach houses called "baches" that were built during the 1920's and 1930's. The building of these baches was banned in 1937 and most have since been removed because Rangitoto is now considered a scenic reserve. Here's one of them that was preserved:

It was a great day for a hike and wonderful just to get out and do something. It's disappointing that the end of our time here has to be spent studying and taking finals, but we are trying to still experience things and hiking Rangitoto definitely made for an enjoyable day.

All Blacks Game!

2008-06-17T19:30:00.001-07:00

This past weekend was the 2nd test match of the Iveco Series, a rugby challenge between New Zealand, Ireland and England. We had watched the New Zealand All Blacks beat Ireland on TV at the Wellington game last week, so we were really excited to actually go to the New Zealand vs. England game in Auckland this weekend.

The All Blacks Rugby Team is New Zealand's pride and joy and from my understanding, gets about as much hype (and probably even more) than football in the US. So needless to say, we were all pretty excited about having the opportunity to see them play in person.

We took a bus to Eden Park, where the stadium was, and got to ride for free just by showing our rugby tickets. The bus was packed and there were people everywhere. The whole city was buzzing and it seemed like everyone was out for the game. I do have to admit though, that I was surprised how many England supporters there were at the game.

We made sure that we were at the game and in our seats in time for the preshow. We didn't want to miss the haka. The haka is a Maori war dance/chant thing that Maori people use to intimidate their opponents before battle. We have seen it performed in several of the maraes we have visited. At one marae we went to, they called some of the boys from Loyola up on stage to teach them part of the haka, which was quite amusing. Anyway, it is tradition that the All Blacks do the haka before every match and basically the other team just stands there and watches. So as much as I was looking forward to the game itself, I really wanted to see the haka as well.

I tried to get it on video. It's pretty far away, but once the cheering dies down, you can kind of hear the chant. (And watch their faces on the stadium screen!)

We really enjoyed watching the game (and even more so because the All-Blacks won 37 to 20)! Since rugby is such a big thing here, we really felt like we were getting a true New Zealand experience being at the game and cheering for the All-Blacks. There was one point where the whole stadium was doing the wave and apparently it was pretty cool. (Unfortunately, I missed it because I was buying fries.)

We wanted to show our support by wearing all black and also by decorating ourselves with face paint (some more than others). I stuck with simple
black and white stripes on my cheeks, but some people went for the whole face (like Cate and Brian).Ed went ALL out and painted his whole upper body black and then Steph drew a really good fern on his chest. People kept stopping Ed and asking to take a picture with him!

After the game let out, it was crazy trying to get back into the city. There were buses and trains, but there were just so many people. We wound up on a couple different buses, but we all did make it back. Since the bus dropped us off on Queen St., we decided to head to the Vulcan, where they have a cover band playing on Saturday nights. It turned out that the other group of Loyola kids showed up there as well. Plus, some Loyola people who had been studying abroad in Australia just happened to have a long layover in Auckland and were visiting some people, so they were there too!

Day Trip to Piha

2008-06-16T04:06:00.000-07:00

Way back in February, when Kelly, Kim, Dana and I went to the Auckland Cup (the horseraces), the rest of our group took surfing lessons at Piha Beach. Piha is one of Auckland's West Coast beaches, famous for it's black sand. We didn't care much that we missed out on the surfing, but we didn't want to leave Auckland without having seen Piha!

So, Kelly, Kim and I rented a car for the day and took the 45 minute drive out to the West Coast. It was a nice drive: first, through Auckland's suburbs and then on very windy roads with lots of hairpin turns through the Waitekere Ranges.

It was a beautiful beach and it wound up being a great day trip out. We got to see Lion Rock (a large rock/hill on the beach that Piha is known for). Here's Kim and Kelly in front of it (you can get an idea of the size):

We even climbed Lion Rock, and this gave us some nice views over the beach. We walked down to touch the water, but of course it was cold at this time of the year. We only saw 2 other people while we were there, plus 1 surfer who was brave enough to face the water!

Here's some pictures from the day:

We also drove about 5 km down the road to another beach, Kerekere. In order to actually get to the beach, you had to cross this stream. The bridge was undergoing construction and we didn't feel like getting all wet trying to cross the stream (plus we were getting very hungry for lunch!) so we just took a picture of the stream!

On a side note, we got use of the rental car again later that night when a group of us took a trip to "Spookers," a year-round Haunted House type place. That's not typically my kind of thing, but I had a fun time anyway. The house was very intricate (since it's open all year, they don't have to dismantle it and reassemble) so it was a fun experience. They take it pretty seriously though - you have to be at least 16 years old to go in! Another weird thing: the people who jump out at you are actually allowed to touch you (this would never happen in the US, but here in New Zealand, it's "no worries" and anything goes). So it was an interesting experience with people coming over and chasing you around with a knife, or grabbing your arm or touching your back. One woman cornered Cate and was rubbing her hands all over Cate's face and neck. (In case you are getting too freaked out, they did tell you that you can put your hands up in front of your face and yell "Stop" and they will back off.) Some people in our group decided to do the "Freaky Forest" as well as the Haunted House, so while I was waiting in the car with Kelly and Lynn, a man with a chain saw came over to the car, opened the car door and turned on the chain saw inside of the car. Kind of creepy. But I'm getting off topic here. What I really wanted to say in this post was simply: Piha was nice!

Final Trip - Day 5: Nelson

2008-06-15T02:23:00.000-07:00

We had to be checked out of the hostel by 10, but free breakfast ended at 9 so we had planned to get up at 8:30 for breakfast and then pack up and check out. I did get up at 8:30, brushed my teeth and washed my face. But then, I realized that no one else seemed to be moving and the breakfast really wasn’t that good anyway, so I just went back to sleep! It turned out no one actually got up for breakfast, so after we checked out, we headed into town (Nelson) to get some food.

We all split up in town and planned to meet back at the cars at 12:30. I went with Brian, Kelly and Cate to a Swedish bakery (the only one in New Zealand) and had a DELICIOUS cinnamon bun.

The lady inside was so cute and friendly. She was talking with us and telling us about their shop and just being really nice. Everything in the bakery shop looked so good that I bought a “chocolate mud muffin” to have later on.

Notice the cinnamon buns in the left case!!

We walked around the town, poking around in some shops and stuff. Cate, Brian and I climbed up to this church at the top of the hill where we had a little view over the town.Then, I decided that the cinnamon bun was SO good and this might be the last time I could ever have one, so I went back to get another one! I was very glad I did. Cate and I got back to the cars before everyone else, and both cars had parking tickets. Not one of the eleven of us thought about having to pay for parking. (Sad, I know, Dad!) Anyway, where we had to pay the fine was actually right across the street so we just went over and paid it right away. We split up the cost between us and it only wound up being $6 a person – not too bad for a stupid mistake.

We filled up the cars with gas and then headed to return the rental cars. When we got there, the guy just came over and drove us to the airport in our respective rental cars, except he drove instead of us! Kind of a weird setup, but it worked – we just kept our luggage in the trunk.

The Nelson Airport was the most lackadaisical airport I have ever been to. None of us had to show any form of identification or go through any type of security or baggage check. Both Brian’s and my plane tickets were on my credit card, but he just gave his name and they gave him a ticket. Since the car was due back at 1, we were at the airport much earlier than we needed to be (our flight was not until 3:50). So we just hung around the airport and entertained ourselves. We got some food at the café and split into 3 tables: one table played the card game Phase 10, my table played the card game Skip-Bo, and one table just hung out and talked.

Then, we boarded the plane and made our way back to Auckland. The next time I get on a plane it will be to go home! It’s crazy to think how fast these 4 months have gone by.

It was a really tiny plane, so we weren't flying that high and had some good views from the air. This is near Nelson, right after take off:

We also flew by Mt Taranaki, which is on the west coast of the North Island. (They call it the Mt Fuji of New Zealand.) It looked really cool because the top of the mountain was above the cloud line.

Final Trip - Day 4: Abel Tasman National Park

2008-06-14T15:01:00.000-07:00

We got up early AGAIN (notice a theme on this trip??) so that we could leave by 7 to drive to Abel Tasman National Park. The hostel provided breakfast (toast and cereal) so we ate that before we left and brought packed lunches of PB&J’s, apples and muesli bars (granola bars). The drive only took an hour, which was less than we had expected, so we were there really early. Our boat wasn’t leaving for a while, so some of us took naps in the car while we waited.

We had booked a “cruise and walk” where we took a small water taxi ride for about an hour, they dropped us off in the national park and then we went on a hike to another bay where they picked us up later on in the day. We had 4 and ½ hours to do a 4 hour hike, but we did it in 3 hours and 35 minutes. In total, we hiked 13 km that day. The scenery was absolutely beautiful and we were just snapping pictures left and right. We were walking along the coast, from bay to bay, but had to climb up hills through the forest at times as well. The hike was actually more strenuous than I was expecting it to be – there were several uphill parts that were pretty steep and lasted for a little while. But everyone did it and we had fun.
The water was a beautiful blue green color and we had a gorgeous sunny day. It was actually a nice temperature out too, especially compared to the cold weather we had had the previous few days. I started out wearing leggings, jeans, a tank top, 2 long sleeve shirts, a short sleeve shirt, a sweatshirt and my Northface jacket (these are all of the layers I had been wearing for the past 2 days), but as we were walking, I began to peel layers off until I just had my tank top and 1 long sleeve shirt on.
We ate our packed lunches on the beach and it was just so pretty. Here's the beach we ate at, with Brian and Rich pretending to throw Dana into the water:I had heard about how beautiful Abel Tasman was (and that was one of the reasons why I really wanted to take this trip back to the South Island because we didn’t make it up there the first time) but seeing it in person was just incredible. One of the parts on the tramp (Kiwi for hike) through the woods crossed over a swing bridge! It was actually a pretty scary bridge because it was a long way down and there was a sign saying that a max of 5 people could be on the bridge at once. Don’t worry, we only lost one person though! (Just kidding!)
We made our way to Torrent Bay, where the boat came to pick us back up. There was a tree swing on the beach and we played on that for a little bit while waiting. Then, when we got back to the car, we went and played on a zipline (called Flying Fox here) before heading out. Two big themes of this trip were getting up before the sunrise and playing on playgrounds/ziplines/swingsets!

Here's Cate, Kim, Me and Kelly overlooking Torrent Bay:
Back at the hostel, I took a 40 minute nap and then got up to get the free soup from the hostel. It was homemade vegetable soup and was actually quite yummy! We ate our soup while watching Mission Impossible 3 on the TV in the common room. We made pasta for dinner and then played Monopoly after dinner. It was a nice relaxing night and we were all exhausted from the hike and from getting up early the past few days.

Final Trip - Day 3: Around Kaikoura

2008-06-13T14:01:00.000-07:00

We woke up early again the next morning (6:20 AM) to bundle up to go whale watching. It was REALLY cold out and we each had about 6 layers of clothes on. I was one of the few people who had brought gloves with me and was very happy I did! We checked out of the hostel and drove to the whale watching place. When we got there, we were informed that the 7 AM tour was canceled due to rough seas. There were 3 more boats scheduled to go out that day (at 10, 10:30, and 12) but they didn’t know yet whether those boats would sail either. They told us to call or stop by 15 minutes before to find out. We all really wanted to do the whale watching, so we decided to try again for the 10 AM boat.
Since we were up anyway, we decided to watch the sunrise. It was a beautiful setting with the mountains and the water. Then, we went back to the hostel and we able to get back into our room to take “naps”/go back to bed for a little while. Our room was freezing, so we just got back into bed with all of our clothes and jackets on (a few people even slept in their shoes)! We slept until 9:30 and then headed into town so that we could stop at a store where people could buy gloves. On our way, the other car called the whale watching company and found out that all of the boats were canceled for the rest of the day. We were disappointed, since that was the main reason we had come to Kaikoura, but we went to the information center (iSite) to come up with an alternate plan.

Everyone except for Rich and James decided to go horseback riding at a local ranch outside of town.

Here's Kelly and I all geared up and ready to ride:

It was a gorgeous day for riding. Bright blue skies, crisp air, and we rode near the mountains which looked beautiful with snow on them. Since there were 9 of us, they split us up into two smaller groups, so we could all talk with the guide. My group’s guide was a very nice woman named Linda. She was really friendly and talkative. My horse’s name was “Star” and I had a great time riding her. Linda let us trot at a couple of points and it was a lot of fun. Everyone was bouncing around, but especially Kelly – her horse “Madam” must have just given a bouncier ride! She was laughing so hard every time we trotted and Linda thought it was very funny. We also got to ride along this stream and then we even crossed it. Our horses went up to their knees at one point!

After horseback riding, we drove back into town to meet up with Rich and James. We got lunch at a café and then walked around town for a bit.

Here's Brian and I down by the water:

We all drove to visit a seal colony that Rich and James found. The seals were up on the rocks and we could get pretty close to them. We had to be careful though, because they get angry if you come between them and the water. We got some good pictures though and it was really cool to be so close to the seals in their natural habitat.

Here's a video of one of the seals waddling along:

We started out on our drive to Nelson, but stopped along the way at Ohau Stream, where Linda told us that there are often baby seals that leave their mothers and come to play in the stream all day. It’s unusual that they come to play in fresh water, because normally they are out at sea. So on Linda’s advice, we stopped to check it out. It was only about a 10 minute walk (if that) to the stream. We were so lucky that we got to see if because there were SO many baby seals just playing around! They were not shy at all and just waddled right up to us. We were literally within inches of them and I think almost everyone got to touch one! I pet one and it was a lot softer than I was expecting – I guess they are called fur seals for a reason!

I was surprised that they were waddling up along the path and into the forest. When I think of seals, I imagine them in the water, not in the woods. It was interesting to see them so close up and so near us, but it was also really fun to watch them playing in the water. There was a waterfall and it was cool to see them playing in it, jumping around and doing flips. I felt like I was watching a seal show at Sea World or something, except I was really watching these baby seals out in the wild. We stayed for a little while, but it was late afternoon and we still had a 3 hour drive ahead of us.

The lighting in the forest was really poor, so it was hard to get good pictures, but here you can see what the baby seals look like:

The girls in the backseat fell asleep for most of the drive, but Rich was sitting up front with me and stayed awake to keep me company and help direct. I was very thankful for that because I was starting to get quite sleepy myself, especially once it got dark out. When we finally got to our hostel, we checked in and we were split up between 3 rooms. It wasn’t the cleanest of hostels, but at least each room had its own bathroom. I was in a room with Kelly, Dana, and Cate.

We headed into town to get dinner, and everyone just wanted to grab Burger King quickly. Kelly, Caitlin and I weren’t up for that, so we split off from the group and got dinner at a Thai restaurant. It wasn’t really very good Thai food, but still definitely better than Burger King. We picked up some stuff at the grocery store for lunches the next day and then headed back to the hostel. We just hung around and played card games and did card tricks!

Final Trip - Day 2: Ferry to South Island

2008-06-11T21:57:00.000-07:00

We had to wake up at 6:30 so that we could get ready and check out of the hostel in time to catch the shuttle bus to the ferry. Unfortunately, our hostel told us the wrong time that we needed to be at the shuttle stop, so we wound up waiting for about a half hour that could have been extra sleep time. There were these 3 Asian men on the shuttle who were clearly tourists and they were wearing these funny hats. They said “New Zealand” and had sparkly sequins on them! We were all joking around and saying how we should all buy one and wear them back at Loyola.

At the ferry, we had to check our luggage as if we were going on a plane. The InterIslander ferry was very large – like a small cruise ship. There were 10 different levels. The bottom ones were for the cargo and the cars and the upper levels were for passengers.

We got breakfast at the café and then settled down in the “reclining lounge” where we took much needed naps. Here's Rich and Dana in the recliners:The ferry ride was about 3 hours. As we got closer and could see land, Dana and I went up to walk around the sundeck and take some photos.

The town of Picton, where the ferry came in to:

Once we got to Picton, we got our luggage off a conveyor belt (again, like at an airport). We went to the car rental office, but it the service was REALLY slow. There was only one woman working there, and there were two other people ahead of us in line. We waited for close to a half hour, and then when she finally got to us, we gave her all of our info. But at the last step, she messed something up in the computer so we had to start all over again giving our address, license number, etc. When we finally got the cars, we had 2 Toyotas: Brian drove the minivan and I drove the Camry. We were all really hungry and stopped at Subway for lunch on our way out of town.

My car made an obnoxious beeping noise if I drove over 110 kph (the speed limit was 100 kph), which was annoying but also good, because I made sure that I didn’t speed. (A couple of weeks ago, I got a speeding ticket in the mail from our first trip to the South Island. Apparently I was caught on a hidden camera going 11 kph over the speed limit. Don’t want another ticket!) It took a little over 2 hours to drive to Kaikoura. It was a pretty drive though, through the Marlborough Wine Region, and then along the coast. We stopped at one point to take some pictures of seals lounging on the rocks. It was really nice out at first, but as we continued on, it got cloudy and started to rain. It was kind of an eerie scene with the storm clouds, the fog, the rain, the mountains and the rough water.

We arrived at our hostel, “The Albatross,” and found out that we were all staying in one room that had a Turkish theme. Some of the beds had curtains and little cutouts to enter them. I stayed in the section of the room that was not Turkish themed, and I just had a regular bunk bed. Since it was nasty weather, we decided to take a trip to the grocery store, and just cook dinner and hang out at the hostel for the night. We split up into 2 dinner groups: the pasta group and the “fiesta” group. I was in on the fiesta and we made a delicious meal of chicken fajitas with peppers, onions, homemade guacamole, cheese, rice, chips and salsa. There were only 4 other people staying in the hostel that night, so we had the whole common area to ourselves. There was a woodburning stove and couches and we all sat around and watched the All-Blacks (the national rugby team) play their first test match of the season. This match was against Ireland and next weekend we are going to go see the All-Blacks play against England. I really enjoyed all of us sitting around watching the game together, especially since I got a better feel for rugby and can now enjoy next week’s game even more! It was a very fun and cozy night and went perfect with the weather. (It even snowed for a bit that night!)

Final Trip - Arrival and Day 1: Wellington

2008-06-11T16:34:00.000-07:00

A group of 11 of us (Me, Kelly, Cate, Kim, her friend Desi, Rich, Dana, James, Brian, Steph and Caitlin) decided to take advantage of the time between classes and finals to go on one last trip. As I mentioned, we didn’t get to see the northern part of the South Island, so we decided to combine that with a visit to Wellington as a last hoorah. It really was a great trip and now you get to hear all about it!

We had a shuttle pick all of us up on Thursday afternoon. We were split up between 2 flights, but since they were within a half hour of each other, we went to the airport together. Once we landed in Wellington and got our luggage, we took a shuttle to our hostel and then headed out in search of food. We wound up getting pizza and then just hung out in the hostel for the night. There was a pool competition downstairs and we all entered it just for fun. It wasn’t like a normal game of pool, everyone took turns taking a shot and you had 3 strikes before being eliminated. It was tricky though, because in each round you had to shoot a specific way, like behind your back, with your opposite hand, or only holding the cue in one hand. The funniest one was spinning around 10 times before you had to shoot. I’m terrible at pool, but actually stayed in the competition pretty long because I make the crazy ones like the one-handed one and the spinning one! (I missed the plain old normal one though!)

The next morning we got up to go explore the city of Wellington. We were staying right in the city center and just walked to a café to get some breakfast. Then, we went to Te Papa (supposedly New Zealand’s best museum), where we spent a few hours exploring. It was a great museum and we all really enjoyed it. There were a lot of interactive exhibits which was cool.

Here's a video of us playing on this music thing. Basically you got to pick a song, and then each of the different circles controls a different part of the song (like a different voice or instrument). If you hold your hand over the circle it will light up and that part will play. So we all picked a different circle and were playing around with it!

For lunch, we went to Wholly Bagels, which was the first bagel I had in New Zealand. It was very yummy! We then took a walk along the water, which was a very pretty walk. We took a cool picture jumping off of these balls we found.

Then, we played on a playground for bit, where there was a really long slide.

And we went on the swings too, while we were at it!

We walked to the Beehive, which is the Executive Wing of the Parliament building. We took a tour of Parliament, which was pretty interesting to see inside. We saw the rooms where different councils and hearings are held. Our tour guide was an odd man, but it was still an interesting experience. After the tour, we went across the street to check out the pub where Members of Parliament supposedly frequent. We didn’t see anyone, but there were interesting statues including one of Helen Clarke, the Prime Minister.

Next, we walked to take a cable car ride up to the Botanical Gardens. Wellington is REALLY hilly, so this was a streetcar type cable car (not a gondola type) that was designed to eliminate what would otherwise be a very steep climb. We had a great view from the top and the sun was starting to set so it looked really pretty!We walked around the gardens for a little bit, but it was starting to get dark and we didn’t really have much time. So we decided to continue with what appeared to be the theme of the day and play on the playground. This was actually a very nice playground, with a zipline, double slides, a seesaw and a tire merry-go-round type thing. Apparently, we can be entertained quite easily!

We showered and got ready back at the hostel and then headed out to get some dinner. We went to Abrakebabra to get, of course, kebabs. I know I said that the one in Mt Eden was good, but this one was up there as well. We got gelato on the walk back which was delicious! (I got chocolate and cinnamon, and the cinnamon one was especially good.) Next, we went bowling! This was the classiest bowling alley I have ever seen. I didn’t bring my camera with me, but it was called a “bowling lounge” and had nice lanes, and a nice bar and some sit down tables. When you first walk in, you could be walking into a restaurant or a classy bar or something – you don’t even see the lanes at first. Bowling was fun and I even got one strike! Afterwards, we checked out a couple of the bars in town, but we had to be up really early the next day, so we didn’t stay out too late.

Since there were 11 of us traveling together, but the rooms at this hostel slept 6 people, my room had 5 of us and one empty bed – for the first night at least! When we got back on the second night, there was a 40-something year old man with a big hairy back sleeping in the bunk above Kim. A bit of an uncomfortable situation to say the least!

One Tree Hill and Mt Eden

2008-06-09T23:45:00.000-07:00

Well I have a lot of catching up to do! We just got back from our trip this evening, but before I blog about that, I wanted to put up some pictures from a little day trip I took before we left for our trip.

I don't have class on Wednesdays, so last week I went with a few people to the neighborhood of Mt Eden and One Tree Hill. We took a bus there and then walked back. It was an 8 km walk home! The bus dropped us off at the base of One Tree Hill, which is an extinct volcanic cone. It got its name because there used to be a solitary pine tree at the top, but it is no longer there and now has the nickname of "None Tree Hill." There is an obelisk monument at the top of the hill, and we walked up to it. It was a nice walk up because it was such a beautiful day out and we enjoyed seeing all of the sheep playing on the hill. We had amazing views over the whole city because where we had to climb up to was pretty far up!

That's Rangitoto Island off in the distance. Another volcano in the Auckland Harbour. I'm hoping to do a day hike there before I leave.

You can see the Skytower in the way back (towards the right). That's pretty much where we had to walk back to!
I really enjoyed walking around the suburbs because it had such a different feel than center city, where we live. We were all getting pretty hungry and stopped to get kebabs before starting our walk back. The kebabs were very good - one of the best I've had, actually. The walk back was nice, and we went through the neighborhood of Mt Eden. It was getting late at this point, so we didn't really stop - just went through it. There were lots of really cute cafes, bakeries, and shops though, so I want to get back there to visit in the next couple of weeks.

It was a good day and well worth seeing what we did. Being out walking in the beautiful fall weather was much more enjoyable than spending my Wednesday off sitting in my room!

Another Trip!

2008-06-04T17:47:00.001-07:00

I haven't been on any big trips in a while, but I'm leaving in about 20 minutes for what is almost certainly the last trip of the semester. We are going to fly to Wellington (the capital of New Zealand), which is located at the southern tip of the North Island. After a couple of days there, we will be taking a ferry across to the South Island to explore what we missed on our previous trip.

I'm excited about this trip, especially since there is a big group going. There are actually 11 of us traveling together (we are going to be split up between 2 vehicles - 5 people in a car with me and 6 people in the "people mover" with Brian).

Anyway, just letting you know that there won't be another post for about a week, but then there should be some good updates! I also have to write about the day trip I took yesterday to One Tree Hill and Mt Eden (Auckland suburbs).

I can't believe that my time here in New Zealand is almost over. Today was my last day of classes. My first exam is not until June 23rd though, so I still have plenty of time to explore Auckland and I definitely plan on doing little day trips to fill the time (and some studying of course!).

An Afternoon at the Museum

2008-06-03T06:05:00.000-07:00

We had off from classes on Monday in honor of the Queen’s Birthday. (Apparently, it was not actually Her birthday, but I’m certainly not going to complain about this technicality since it gave us a day off!) I pretty much just hung around the apartment all morning. The most productive thing I accomplished was making myself breakfast, which was actually quite good if I might say so myself! (I had scrambled eggs with mushrooms and red pepper, and toast with avocado.)
Anyway, I was determined not to waste the day, and it seemed that a few of my friends felt the same way. So I went with James, Nick, Cate, Ed, and TK to the Auckland Museum. It’s about a 20 minute walk, through Auckland Domain (one of the city’s parks), but it’s an uphill walk and we certainly got our exercise! There is technically not an admission fee to the museum, just a suggested $5 donation. We all paid the $5, except for TK who only had $1.60 in his pocket. He did, however, give all of what he had, so good job TK! It was well worth it, in my opinion, because it provided a fun and even somewhat educational afternoon. See, we are learning things over here, we just choose to do most of it outside the classroom!
This was an interesting museum with quite a diverse display of exhibits. It reminded me somewhat of The Museum of Natural History. The bottom floor was all about Pacific History, and of course had a strong Maori focus. We saw some really cool (and lethal!) spears, lots of pottery and such, and many Maori carvings. They also had a really pretty marae that you could go inside. I can’t believe how many different marae I’ve had the opportunity to enter. Inside of the marae:

The next level was about Natural History, and had lots of stuffed animals and such. There was even a stuffed elephant, which took a taxidermist 7 months to complete!

There were also some dinosaur skeltons:

There was a whole section on volcanoes, but there was also this room that you could watch a video in. You walked in and it looked like a living room, with couches, a TV and a coffeetable. It was supposed to give you an idea of what it would be like if a volcano erupted in Auckland Harbour, and it was actually pretty cool! The TV screen showed the "news" and was describing the possibility of an eruption, when all of a sudden you could see it happening in the big "window." The cloud approached and the room started shaking and it was a neat little simulation.

The top floor was dedicated to New Zealand war history, and also had a war memorial. There was also some random modern art:

We spent about 2 hours walking around the museum and I have to say I’m quite glad I did it. It was nice to get out and just go do something different. We walked back home a different way than we had come – it’s always nice to mix it up. I don’t know if anyone else can say the same, but personally I really enjoyed our discussion on the walk back too! We were all reminiscing about our childhoods, and fighting with our siblings and getting punished or getting away with stuff when we were little. It was really interesting and amusing to hear everyone’s different stories. I know that might seem a weird thing to discuss in my blog, but I really feel like I’ve become close with all of the people here and have learned a lot about everyone individually in the four months we’ve been together. So it’s those simple little things, like specific conversations, that I’m going to remember from this whole experience, in addition to the amazing things we’ve seen and done.

The Viaduct

2008-05-30T21:31:00.000-07:00

It was a beautiful day out the other day, so I took a walk down by the water to the Viaduct Harbour. This is an area where there are a bunch of bars and restaurants right near the water. It was pretty to just walk around. Not much to say about it, but here are some pictures:

Dinner at the Skytower!

2008-05-30T16:32:00.000-07:00

The Skytower is the icon of Auckland and, at 328 m high, is the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere. (To put that into perspective, the Empire State Building is 381 m at the top floor, and 443 m including the pinnacle.) BUT, since the high rise buildings in Auckland aren't really that tall, the Skytower really stands out and is very noticeable. You can pretty much spot it from most places in the city.

So, last night a group of 11 of us decided to go up to the Skytower to see the observatory floor and to have dinner at the revolving restaurant (appropriately named 'Orbit'). It was a very enjoyable evening. We made our reservations as early as we could (5:30) so that we would be up in the Skytower to enjoy the views while it was still light out and also to see it at night, with the whole city lit up. We took the elevator up to the main observatory floor (a section of the elevator floor was glass, and it was cool to look down). We had a great view of the city and got to watch the sunset as well. I kept snapping pictures of pretty much the same thing since the lighting was constantly changing. Here's a progression of the sun setting:

I really enjoyed having a bird's eye view of this city that I have been walking around in for the past 4 months. We spotted our apartment building and campus and all of the places that we walk around - it was really an interesting experience!

You could walk the whole 360 degrees around the observatory floor, and some sections of the floor were glass. Here's me standing on the glass looking down:We were pretty high up!

We also got to watch someone jump off the Skytower! They do this thing called the "Sky Jump," which is kind of like base jumping while being attached to a wire. You get an 11 second free fall (going about 85 kpm), but then they slow you down to a smooth stop at the bottom (so no bouncing like bungy jumping). We had an interesting vantage point, because the person was suspended right in front of us and then dropped.

Here's a video of the guy doing the Sky Jump: (I didn't think when I took the video that I shouldn't take it vertical, so you'll just have to turn your head to view it!)

After a half hour of enjoying the view and taking pictures, we headed to the restaurant to eat. The kitchen, elevator, bathrooms, etc. were all in the center part, which did not rotate, and]the tables were all located on a platform that did rotate. It was a fun experience. We ordered off an a la carte menu, but as long as everyone spent over $30, the elevator ride and trip to the observatory were free. Since the main courses all ranged from $25-$35, this was not difficult to accomplish. The food was really good too, so I figured that if you went to a nice restaurant, you could easily spend $30 per person, but here, we were getting a nice meal, plus an amazing view, an elevator ride, a trip to the observatory floor, and we got to eat in a revolving restaurant! Not bad at all, if you ask me!

Now I know New Zealand is famous for its lamb, but I've only had it twice since I've been here. Once was on the Loyola Taupo/Rotorua trip, where I had grilled lamb chops and the other time I bought lamb loin at the grocery store and cooked it myself. Both times it was very good. So, I figured that since I was at a nice restaurant, I would get lamb again. I was very happy with my choice because it was delicious. It was lamb tenderloin served over mashed potatoes, with a tomato, rosemary and kalamata olive compote. Kelly ordered the fish special, which I got to taste as well: red snapper with a tomato and caper salsa served over corn risotto. Everything was just delicious and I wish I could have had a sampler plate with several of the main courses because they all sounded so good!

We had a funny experience with the waiter. This was a nice restaurant, and I guess most people would probably order an entree (they call starters entrees here) AND a main. We, being cheap college students, were splurging enough just for the main meal. So Timm ordered first and ordered pasta as his main. Then, the waiter said "And to start?" and Timm thought that he HAD to order a starter as well. So he switched his pasta to be as a starter and then ordered salmon as his meal. But then as everyone else ordered, Timm realized that he wasn't required to order two courses and he changed his order. But somehow it got messed up and the waiter still brought him a starter! The waiter was reluctant to take it back and Timm felt really bad. The manager even came over to apologize to Timm. It was pretty funny!

Afterwards, some people went to the casino in the Skytower right from dinner. I went back to Empire with some of the boys (I wanted to change out of my heels!). Then, a little later on I walked back to the casino with TK and Gina and met everyone else there. I'm pretty sure that this was the first time I have ever been to a casino and I decided in about the first minute that it's not a place for me! Since I was there, I wanted to try something just for fun, so I put a $2 coin into the cheap slot machines and played a couple of games. Of course, I didn't win anything. Some people lost a good amount of money playing the tables. Not that I ever really thought otherwise, but this experience confirmed the fact that I am definitely not a gambler.

When everyone had had enough of the casino, we went to Empire Taverns to hang out for a bit. There was a nice cover band playing so we stayed there for a bit and then went to Denny's to get dessert. (Yes, there is a Denny's in Auckland.) I was pretty hungry, since even though the food was really good at the Sky Tower, the portions weren't all that large. So, I ordered pancakes a la mode, which completely hit the spot because I couldn't decide whether I wanted to order breakfast or dessert. It started raining while we were eating, so we stayed for a little while to see if we could wait out the rain, but it didn't seem to be stopping. Most people took a cab home, but TK, Gina and I decided to brave the rain and just walked back. We all had a very nice night!

Auckland Zoo

2008-05-26T01:15:00.000-07:00

As I think I mentioned, a couple of weekends back we went to the zoo. There's not TOO much to say about it - we basically went and spent the day looking at the animals! (Unusual for a zoo, right?)

But it was a fun day, and I definitely enjoyed Auckland's zoo. It was a lot larger than I thought it would be, but we pretty much spent the whole day there and got to see a lot. My favorite part was that most of the animals were not caged in as they would be at a zoo at home. They weren't running around the zoo or anything, but they were in mostly open spaces. It seemed like the zoo really tried to make the surroundings seem like the natural habitats of the animals. In most cases, the animals were just separated from the people in such a way that they couldn't get out, but we could still view them. (I'm not totally sure I'm making much sense here, but I'm just trying to say that they seemed less caged than other zoos I've seen!)

Anyway, here are some pictures from the day (Oh, and you might notice that these pictures are a bit larger. I'll make the pictures this size from now on!):

Gazelles relaxing: And the rhinos were in the same area as the gazelles, all roaming around together:
The giraffes were in the in the "Grasslands" section:
Here's a sea otter. They were really cute when they swam:

And a meercat...I think:
This big turtle thing is actually a Galapagos Tortoise:
We saw a whole orang-utan family! The baby was so cute! He climbed up onto a little wooden platform and then fell over and rolled down the hill.
This elephant has a lot of hair!

Lazy Sunday

2008-05-25T21:58:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a very enjoyable day for me and even though it was not super eventful, since it was so relaxing for me, I'm going to write about it for myself to remember! (Plus, maybe this will show that despite my posts, we're not doing something extreme or exciting every waking moment, but we still enjoy ourselves.)

So, yesterday morning, I actually slept in without setting an alarm. This was probably the first time I have done that in at least two months. After waking up well rested, I showered and got ready. I had told Nick and James the night before that I would make them french toast, so they came over so I could make good on my promise. I had a piece myself and they seemed to enjoy it, so I was happy about that. I wouldn't want to serve them anything that wasn't up to par!

Right after "breakfast" (a term I use very loosely because of the time), a group of us went grocery shopping at New World. Now, grocery shopping can be quite an ordeal here. There are really only 2 big supermarkets that are easily accessible: Foodtown, which is a good 20-30 minute walk (depending on who you walk with and how much stuff you are carrying!) and New World, which is a big farther away, but offers a free shuttle Thursday through Sunday. Because the New World shuttle picks us up right outside of Empire Apartments, I usually opt to go there.

However, the way the shuttle schedule works, you have either 30 minutes to shop (which is a pretty tight squeeze since the checkout lines are usually rather slow) or an hour and 30 minutes (which is too long and you have to hang around doing nothing while waiting for the shuttle). So lately, we've been playing our own "Supermarket Sweep" when we go shopping. Everyone has their lists ready and we run through the supermarket trying to get everything we need and get through the lines in time. We all meet back on the shuttle, and if you were too slow and missed it, you are out of luck and get left behind! (I once ran through the parking lot to catch the bus before it pulled out, only to find out that it was just turning around and not actually leaving for another few minutes. My friends who were already on the shuttle got a good laugh out of this!) Anyway, yesterday our group all made it back on the shuttle in time. James accidentally left one of his bags at the checkout and the driver even waited for him to run back inside and get it.

When we got back from the store, Lynn, Caitlin and I headed over to campus to try to watch a movie for our English class. Since it was a Sunday, however, the doors were locked and we couldn't get into the building without a special access key that we didn't have. So, we just walked back to Empire.

There is a cafe downstairs in the lobby that was open the first couple of days that we got here but has been closed ever since. It just reopened as a new place this week. So, Lynn, James, Kim, Caitlin and I decided to go there for dinner. The menu is a little on the pricey side for what they offer, but the food is pretty decent. However, I got what we have named "The Timm Special": a cheese pizza. Now, if you want to know why a plain pizza would have this name, it's because Timm worked his magic and got a cheese pizza to be entered into the computer system for only $5! The two pizzas that are actually listed on the menu have several toppings and go for $9.50. But Timm asked if there was a discount for just a plain pizza and bargained for $5. So far, they haven't upped the price and it's a great deal! So last night, 4 out of 5 of us ordered it! It's actually a very good pizza, in my opinion. It has a nice crispy thin crust and I really enjoyed it (even more so because it was so cheap)!

After dinner, we decided that we wanted dessert, but didn't really feel like anything on the menu. So, we made a spontaneous decision to go to another restaurant and just order dessert! We walked down to Queen St. and went up one of the side streets to a fancy-ish restaurant that James knew of. All 5 of us actually ordered the same thing: Mississippi Mud Cake. It was delicious!!! Warm chocolate cake with chocolate sauce, whipped cream, vanilla ice cream, custard and kiwi slices - yum. Anyone aware of my love of chocolate knows that this sounds like the perfect dessert for me! We had a really nice time at dessert and were all very happy with our decision. We were stuffed by the end and only James was able to finish his. So we all gave the little bit we had left to Lynn, and it made a nice takeaway for her. (She actually told me that it heated up nicely as breakfast this morning!)

It was still early, so we decided to continue our evening together. We got changed into comfy clothes and then everyone plus Nick came back to my room to watch a movie. We watched "Equilibrium" (which I found very entertaining) followed by 2 episode of "The Office." I was getting very sleepy and went to bed pretty much right after everyone left.

So, this was kind of just a lazy day, but we had fun! It's definitely one of those ordinary days that I will remember. Even if we aren't off traveling or doing crazy things here, we still manage to have a great time. Since we don't have too many "big" things left planned, some of my future posts might be more of this style.

Love,
Lauren

Waiheke Island Vineyard Tour

2008-05-24T18:20:00.001-07:00

Waiheke Island is one of several islands accessible by ferry from downtown Auckland. Waiheke has a reputuation for beautiful beaches and great wine. We didn't get a chance to go to Waiheke while the weather was still warm enough for the beach, but I still really wanted to see the island. So, we decided to take a vineyard tour to experience the island's other main attraction besides the beach. We got to visit 3 of Waiheke's 26 vineyards. Apparently the climate on the island is similar to that in Bordeaux, France and thus the wine is supposed to be comparable as well.

The ferry ride took about 40 minutes and since it was a beautiful day, it was very enjoyable being out on the water. We went past Devonport (which was one of the first day trips we took here in New Zealand) as well as Motuihe Island (where we did the volunteer tree planting):

Here's Rangitoto Island (that's an extinct volcano):

Once we got to Waiheke, we boarded the vineyard tour bus. Our driver was pretty quirky and kept us entertained throughout the day with his commentary.

The first stop was at Stonyridge Vinegard, which mainly produces organic red wine. It is known as a "boutique vineyard," because of its small size. About 90% of their wine is sold before it is even bottled! We saw the winecellar, which was very small since they don't produce a large amount of wine. They pride themselves on their organic grapes, with no use of insecticides or herbicides. Here we sampled a chardonnay during our walk through the property and a cabernet merlot with our light lunch. We had sandwiches which were pretty good! There is also an olive grove on the property:

Our next stop was actually the olive oil factory where the olives from Stonyridge are sent to be turned into olive oil. At Rangihoua Estate, they have a machine which they use to produce their olive oil from their own olives, but they also allow the locals to bring in their olives as well (for a fee of course!). I found the tour of the olive oil factory really interesting actually! We saw the machine where they produce the oil and the woman explained to us how it worked. What I found most interesting was that they do not actually press the oil, but instead use a centrifuge to spin the crushed olive mixture so that it separates into 3 layers: the oil, the "fruit water," and the paste remnants. Then, since New Zealand is so eco-friendly, they feed the paste to grazing cows instead of discarding it as waste! (The machine is, of course, made in Italy!)We also learned about the different qualities of olive oil and what defines the oil as "extra virgin." The best part about the tour though were of course the tastings! Rangihoua is currently producing 4 different types of extra virgin olive oil, which differ in the types of olives used. They had bread for us to dip in the different oils, and they really all had distinct tastes! It was delicious!

Next, we continued on to Wild On Waiheke Vineyards. Here, I sampled a Savignon Blanc, a Rose, and a Cabernet Merlot. They also have a microbrewery as well, and we got to try their wheat beer, which I didn't particularly like, but did enjoy more than other wheat beers I have tried before. Here we also got to sample various dips and dressings, my two favorites of which were a rosemary infused balsamic vinegar and a wasabi mustard.

Our final stop was at Mudbrick Vineyards. This was perched way up on the hillside and had a BEAUTIFUL view back across the water to Auckland where, of course, you could see the Skytower. This vineyard had pretty gardens with lavender growing and the restaurant had outdoor seating. It had a very French feel to me. We first tried a Rose here, which was a Cabernet Savignon. I much prefered this Rose to the one at the previous place, which I found to be a little too sweet. (Yes, I'm actually learning a bit about wine and am able to pick up on the differences!) Here, we got to walk up through the vineyards and learned about how the grapes grow and what must be done to ensure that they crop is good. I found all of this very interesting! We tried two more wines here, both of which were red, very dry, and I didn't really care for either of them.

We then headed back to the bus and caught our ferry ride back to Auckland. I REALLY enjoyed the day and Waiheke was very beautiful. You can tell right away when you get onto the island that it is an upscale place. There were some beautiful houses and in general it just has an upmarket feel to it. It would definitely be a beautiful place to retire, and I'm sure many people have had that same idea. Apparently New Zealand's richest man (whose name I forget) lives on Waiheke. The island originally was a place where artists and others seeking an alternative lifestyle came to escape more mainstream society. But then, as the island became more discovered and built up, most of those people left and moved elsewhere. Regardless, the island was certainly very pretty and I had a very enjoyable day!

Exploring Auckland

2008-05-23T00:06:00.000-07:00

It's starting to sink in that our time here is winding down. We still have 5 weeks left (a good solid amount of time), but considering that we've been here for over 3 months, it doesn't feel like we have that much time left. As a result, I've been making a conscious effort to go out and explore the city I'm living in.

I've been lucky that we've had several beautiful fall days lately. So the weather has been great for taking walks. Auckland is full of different neighborhoods, and it's really nice to just walk around and explore. There are lots of cafes and I love just strolling around and maybe stopping to grab a coffee or a muffin. (I've probably had more cups of coffee and muffins in these past couple of months than in the past couple of years combined!)

I don't have too much to really SAY about these walks because they pretty much just consist of walking (shocking, I know!) and looking around. So hopefully you can get a little idea from the pictures.

This was in a park in Ponsonby. Part of the sidewalk was tiled with an interesting mosaic.

Today I walked around Parnell. I was having trouble with my iPod and brought it to a store there, so since I was in the neighborhood, I decided to just stroll around. It's a pretty upscale neighborhood that is very residential in parts, but also has a main street with lots of cute shops, restaurants and cafes.

Here's a restaurant with garden seating:

And I found a cool piece of sidewalk in Parnell as well! There were pieces of broken ceramic in the sidewalk:
Continuing my pretty much random walk, I decided to take a look inside the cathedral that I've passed by several times now. I was just curious what the inside looked like, but as soon as I stepped through the door, this little old lady approached me. She gave me info so that I could do a quick "self-guided tour." She was just so friendly I had to take the pamplet from her! It was helpful though, because I learned that the stained glass window there (which was very pretty!) is the largest stained glass window in the Southern Hemisphere! The cathedral was nice inside, so I was happy with my decision to check it out.

The organ pipes (I realize that is probably pretty evident from the picture, but I'm telling you anyway!):
A pretty stained glass window:

And here's the really large one (Dad, this is for you):

This was another church right next door to the cathedral:

And in case you were wondering, yes, there ARE Starbucks in New Zealand. Tons of them, in fact. This one in Parnell is super-classy though, with the carved wooden sign:

And here's just a pretty street that I liked on the walk back: This is in the neighborhood of Newmarket, right next to Parnell. I don't know if you can see or not, but there's a cafe with outdoor tables.

So hopefully this random selection of photos gives you a slight feel for some of Auckland's neighborhoods!

Around Campus

2008-05-15T21:42:00.000-07:00

***WARNING: This post is not about a trip or adventure I went on, but it's about school.

Yes, contrary to the impression you have probably gotten from all of my previous posts, I AM actually in New Zealand to attend the University of Auckland. (Well, at least that's the official reason!) So while I've had my share of adventures here, and there still are more to come, the past couple of weeks have been pretty laid back. Everyone is starting to run low on funds, so we can't really be off traveling every weekend like we did when we first got here. We're still having a great time though and do have one more big trip planned. (I'll keep you in suspense about that...it's not for another couple of weeks.)

So in the meantime, we've been hanging around Auckland and doing school stuff. It seems like everyone (and I can defintely vouch for this personally) has been pretty busy lately with lots of papers and other such school stuff. I actually just finished writing a paper for my history class. We're still finding time to enjoy ourselves though - don't worry! We've had several birthdays lately to celebrate, which always makes for a good time. Last weekend, we had a girls' night where we went to dinner and a movie. A big group of us also went bowling, which was a lot of fun. Since school back at home just got out for the summer, we've also been getting some visitors. Several people have family member, friends, boyfriends and girlfriends coming to visit.

Last weekend, we also did a volunteer project where we took a ferry to a nearby island and planted trees for the day. The island is uninhabited, and the Department of Conservation is trying to preserve the island by restoring it to it's original natural condition. We did weeding and planting for most of the day, but the highlight for me was when Kim, Nick and I were asked if we could "help dig a hole." We agreed, and the 3 of us were then taken on a ride out to a secluded beach where we were told that there was a dead baby dolphin that needed to be buried! It was so cute, even though it was dead. We dug the hole and before we put him in, we all got to put on gloves and touch the dolphin. I wish it had been alive, but still, that was a really unique experience getting to bury a baby dolphin.

ANYWAY, I'm getting off track here. The point of this post was to show you around campus a bit. My dad was asking me about the campus and I took some pictures a while back for him. So, I figured I could share them here. The facilities here are actually pretty nice, so take a look and see what you think!

"The Quad":
The Statistics computer lab, where I work on my assignments (notice all of the iMac computers!):

The Engineering Building:
The Rec Center (with the Skytower in the background, of course):
Cafe outside the Student Center:
Main area of campus:
Some random building, not really sure what:

The University Marae (Maori meeting house):
Pacific Studies Building:

The Business School:

Pretty nice, right?

South Island: Day 7 - Drive back to Christchurch

2008-05-12T17:04:00.000-07:00

The next morning, we had a decent drive ahead of us. We had to drive back to Christchurch, which was about 5 and a half hours away. Before we left Dunedin though, we wanted to check out Baldwin St., the world’s steepest street! We weren’t confident in our car’s ability to get to the top, but we parked at the bottom and walked up. Let me tell you – it IS steep! We felt accomplished after the climb though!
Looking from the bottom to the top:
Looking down from the top (you can't even see part of it, because it's so steep!):

We headed out of town, but while we were driving we saw a sign for a “cheese factory” and decided to check it out. It turned out to be a very worthwhile stop, because we enjoyed the cheese and bought some to have with our dinner later that night. The shopkeeper was also really friendly and offered us some suggestions on places to stop along our drive. We had heard from SEVERAL different people that the drive up to Christchurch is supposed to be incredibly boring (I’m not exactly sure why), so this man gave us a detour to go around the boring part.

His first suggestion was to stop at “Shag Point,” where you can see shag birds, seals and sometimes penguins. Again, we didn’t have much luck with the penguins, but there was a huge bird colony and we also saw about 25 seals! Plus, the coastline was beautiful as well, so we were really happy with our stop! It was really cold and windy out though, so we didn’t stay too long.
Those are seals on the rocks:

Next, we drove along to the Moeraki Boulders, which are these rocks on the beach that naturally formed into perfect spheres and half-spheres. We were expecting them to be larger than they were, but it was still pretty interesting to see. You are supposed to come at low tide, but we just went when we could - so the water level was kind of high and was coming up around some of the boulders. We waited for the waves to go out and then ran to jump on the boulders. It was a very pretty beach. We also ate lunch at the café there, so again, this was a good stop!

We continued on and at the cheese man’s suggestion, drove inland to a town called Geraldine. There, we went to a jam/jelly shop and had some free tastings! It was starting to get late and we wanted to get back on the road, so we didn’t stay in the town for too long. But we were definitely glad that we chose the “Inland Scenic Route” because it turned out to be a very pretty drive, especially with the sun beginning to set.
By the time we arrived at our hostel in Christchurch, it was raining. Then, it began to hail! It was really coming down and the hail was about the size of Skittles. We had to get our luggage out of the car, and it kind of hurt to get pelted with the hail drops. We ate our delicious cheese (a cheddar-style brie) with crackers, and then we all took showers before dinner. We made pasta for dinner, but everyone was still pretty full from all the cheese and crackers. After we got all of our suitcases packed and ready for the plane, we got to bed.
We had to wake up at 4:30 AM to give us time to get ready, drive to the airport, return the rental car and get checked in. We also made ourselves some Cadbury hot chocolate before we left! It was POURING rain when we had to walk from the car park to the terminal and we got completely drenched. We were all exhausted by the time we got back to Empire Apartments. This was SUCH a fun trip though! We saw some absolutely beautiful scenery and had a great time. It was fast paced and we did a lot of driving (we drove 2100 km!), but since the drives were so beautiful, we didn’t mind at all. To anyone who has only a short time to visit New Zealand, I would definitely recommend going to the South Island. The landscape is just so diverse and incredibly gorgeous.

We pulled over on the side of the road to take this picture EXACTLY when the odometer said 2000 kilometers!

South Island: Day 6 - The Catlins and Dunedin

2008-05-06T22:48:00.000-07:00

The view from "Hilltop," our appropriately named hostel:Since it was dark and raining on our drive the night before, we wanted to actually see the Catlins in the daylight the next morning. There are some really beautiful stretches of coastline, with lots of sheltered and pretty much deserted coves. We headed towards one and stopped along the way to visit some waterfalls. They were called Purakaunui Falls, and we just had to walk about 10 minutes through the forest to get there.
Next, we headed along to see some of the coast. We went to some bay/cove that we don’t even know the name of. It was really pretty and there was no one there but us. We just drove down a little gravel road and wound up with a beautiful sight in front of us! There was a little hill that you could drive up, and we kind of wanted to see what was up there. As we were driving, we realized that the road probably had a few too many potholes and ditches in it for this to be a good idea! We were starting to get stuck, so we decided to bail out of that plan while we were ahead and before we ACTUALLY got stuck. (Seriously, it would have been quite possible that no one else would have come along to that cove all day.) So we took some pictures and then continued on our way.
Here's some typical Catlins scenery - green rolling hills dotted with lots of sheep!
Our drive to Dunedin didn’t take that long and once we brought our stuff into the hostel, we took a quick power nap. Then, we had to be up to make it to our tour of the Cadbury Chocolate Factory! (We had a little ordeal parking. We found a garage to park in, but were confused by the signs as to where exactly we were allowed to park, so I had to back up several times. Then, once we finally got parked, we were trying to get rid of some of our coins and were paying with all 10 and 20 cent coins, which the machine would randomly decide to spit out on us!) So by this point we were running a little behind schedule and literally ran from the parking lot to the Cadbury factory because we didn’t want to miss our tour!

Kim and I at the Cadbury factory (notice the hairnets we were required to wear!):
I really enjoyed the tour. The smells were absolutely delicious, and it was really interesting to see everything on the conveyor belts, going through all the different assembly line processes. PLUS, we got a good amount of free candy throughout the tour! The highlight of the tour for us was when we were going through the packaging part of the factory. There were 3 women working on putting the finished bags into boxes. Cate signaled to one of the women to throw a bag over to her. The woman smiled and mouthed, “I’d love to,” but shook her head that she really couldn’t. But then, she threw it down the line to another woman, who was able to throw it over the fence without our tour guide seeing it. I just thought it was so funny and cute that they were willing to risk getting in trouble, just to throw us a bag of chocolates.

We left the factory feeling slightly sick of candy. We had heard that Sandfly Bay on the Otago Peninsula was a good spot to view penguins. Since we really wanted to see them, and it was just a short drive outside of Dunedin, we decided to go for it. We parked the car and had to walk about 40 minutes to where the viewing spot was. It was a rough walk, downhill, through some steep sandy areas and then all the way across the beach. The sun was setting though, and the lighting just kept changing, so I took a TON of pictures. On the beach, we saw a sea lion and literally got within a few feet of it! When we finally got to the penguin viewing hut, we WERE able to see some penguins, but they were pretty far away. We had reservations for a tour of Speight’s Brewery at 7, so we could only stay for a little bit. The walk back to the car was really tough though – much worse than the way there! We were all out of breath by the time we got back.

The tour of Speight’s way pretty interesting. They call Speight’s beer “The Pride of the South,” and the people on the South Island ARE actually pretty proud of their Gold Medal winning beer. We got a tour all through the brewery, seeing exactly how the beer is made. Then, at the end, you of course get to sample it as well! Speight’s is currently producing 6 different types of beer: their regular Speight’s, a dark beer, Pale Ale, Pilsner, Porter (dark, chocolately taste), and one which they call Old Distinction.

After our tour, we had planned to go to the Speight’s Ale House for dinner, but we didn’t realize that it was so popular that we would need reservations. Our tour guide suggested a different restaurant instead. We went to a place called “Lonestar,” where we split 2 main meals between the four of us. We were all exhausted and it was getting late so we just went back to the hostel and went to bed.

South Island: Day 5 - Milford Sound

2008-05-05T16:41:00.000-07:00

We had to get up pretty early because we had booked a kayaking trip at Milford Sound. This is in an area called Fiordland, where there are inlets, large mountains, waterfalls, and overall just very pretty scenery. It is a huge area and very difficult to access. It takes almost 2 hours to get to Milford Sound by road from the nearest town. Then, to actually see it, most people take a boat ride out through the fjord. We decided to kayak instead, and I was really happy with our choice!

The outfits that we wore to kayak were pretty funny. We had thermal long johns, a fleece sweatshirt, a rain jacket, a kayaking “skirt,” and a hat. The hat was definitely the best part though, because we got to choose from a bin of some very random hats. Cate and I were in the same kayak and decided to make ours a Christmas kayak – so we wore Santa hats! Kim and Lynn looked rather funny as well.

We kayaked for 4 hours and traveled about 14 km in total. It was really pretty and was surprisingly very relaxing. It was drizzling a little when we started out, but then it cleared up as the morning went on. (You can see the progression in these photos!)

They say that Milford Sound looks really pretty in the rain as well as in sunny weather, so we were lucky that we got to see it both ways. We basically hugged the coastline, then cut across the water and came back along the other side. When we were traveling along the coast, we got to see a few seals! One of them was really playful and was flipping around in the water. When we were paddling across the sound, we went out halfway, then stopped and ate our lunches in the middle. In every direction you looked, it was just absolutely beautiful.

It was an odd experience because our perception of size and distance were totally off. ALL of the mountains at Milford Sound are just so huge, that its hard to get a good perspective on how big everything really is, because they are all about the same size. The highest mountain there, called Mitre Peak, is actually a mile high, but it doesn’t really “stand out” as much as you would expect. Similarly, there is a waterfall that is supposedly 3 times the height of Niagra Falls, but personally I wouldn’t have thought that it was even half the size of Niagra! (Here's Cate with the falls in the background:)
On our way back, the wind was blowing against us and it was very difficult to paddle. It literally felt like we were not moving at all. On top of that, since I was in the front of the kayak, the wind kept blowing the water off of my paddle and on to Cate to the point where she was soaked! By the time we finally got back, we were all exhausted from paddling, but I was definitely glad that this was the way we chose to explore Milford Sound.
We even got to see a rainbow!

After getting changed, we got back in the car for our drive to the Catlins. Our next hostel was about 5 hours away, but we were hoping to make it to Nugget Point by dusk to see the penguins come ashore. There are 2 species of penguins that are common in New Zealand (blue penguins and yellow eyed penguins), but they come ashore in the night time to avoid humans. Some of our friends who visited the South Island a couple of weeks ago got unusually close to the penguins at Nugget Point, and we were hoping to be as lucky. Unfortunately, the drive took a little longer than we expected, especially since we were driving on a gravel road once we got off of the main road. So by the time we actually got there, it was already dark. We did get to see some penguins in the distance, but it was really cold out and was starting to rain, so we just decided to keep moving and check in to our hostel.

We had to stop to pick up something for dinner and we made it to the grocery store RIGHT before it was closing. We picked up stuff to make French toast, which we cooked at our hostel. We forgot syrup, but put sugar and cinnamon on instead. It actually turned out to be rather yummy! Our hostel in Papatowai was REALLY nice. It was called “Hilltop” and was a small little house with a kitchen, a living room, 2 bedrooms (our 4 person room and one double room), and 2 bathrooms. It had a very homey feel to it. We were all exhausted and went to bed early that night.

South Island: Day 3 and Day 4 - Queenstown

2008-05-04T20:55:00.000-07:00

We woke up early to check out of the hostel and headed to Queenstown. We had an absolutely beautiful drive. Even though we were in the car for about 5 and a half hours, it was really an enjoyable ride because the scenery was just so amazing. We were driving through mountains and past lakes. We stopped for a picnic lunch (well, really peanut butter sandwiches!) at one of the lakes. Parts of the drive were very twisty and windy, but around every turn was a new sight! Honestly, this drive was probably one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. Between the mountains, the lakes, the blue sky and the fall colors, it was just beautiful!
We were driving along Lake Wanaka and a mountain range called “The Remarkables” for a good portion of the drive. We went on some pretty steep and windy mountain roads, which gave us some great views of Queenstown coming in. When we arrived, we went to our hostel to check in and drop off our stuff before walking around town. It was really a fun town to just walk around in because there was a lot going on. There were lots of shops and restaurants. We found a camera store where Lynn could get her camera battery charged because she had accidentally left her charger on our last trip.

We were all exhausted and decided to take a nap back at the hostel before dinner. Then, we walked back into town to go to dinner at Fergburger. It’s a pretty famous burger place with unusual specialty burgers. The burgers were ENORMOUS, but absolutely delicious!

Here's Kim and Lynn enjoying their monster burgers:

We were completely stuffed when we left, but very happy with our meals. Back at the hostel, we showered up and got ready to go out. We checked out 3 different bars in town: The Buffalo Club, Altitude, and World Bar, all of which were interesting in their own way.

The following day, we got up at 8 so that we could check out of the hostel and pack up the car. Then, we drove to the Skyline Gondola. Kim and I had booked paragliding, while Lynn and Cate were going bungy jumping. We wished them luck before they headed off to jump 134 meters! The weather was very overcast, so before taking the gondola ride up, I called the paragliding place to make sure our trip was still going to go on. The man told us to come up and that he would meet us up there, so we paid for our gondola and took the ride up to the mountain. It was a really steep cable car ride, and we had great views over the lake. BUT, as we were riding, it started to rain, and by the time we got to the top, it was coming down pretty hard. We found the paragliding office, but there was no one there, so I called the guy again. He said that he was on his way up and he came over to talk to us. He said that because of the weather, “unfortunately we wouldn’t be able to fly today.” He kept repeating that exact phase and seemed really uncomfortable and awkward. I was kind of disappointed, because I was really looking forward to it, but at the same time, it was getting more and more foggy and overcast, so it really didn’t make sense to go. I said to him, “I know this might be a silly question, but is there any way we could get our gondola ride refunded, because the only reason we came up here was to paraglide?” He told us no at first, but then he took out his own wallet and handed us $40! He told us that this was the first time that a refund had been given out in the 18 years that the paragliding company has been operating. I felt kind of bad, but not so bad that I didn’t accept the money!

The view from the top of the gondola:
So Kim and I took a nice ride back down the mountain and then geared up in our jackets to brave the rain. It was Kim’s birthday, so we decided to treat ourselves to a nice birthday brunch. We went to this really cute café where we split pancakes and eggs. But these were not just any old pancakes and eggs! The pancakes were blackberry and blueberry pancakes with honeycomb and lemon butter and the eggs were poached eggs, served on ciabatta bread with grilled capers and cheese. Everything tasted wonderfully delicious! Then, we just strolled around the town a bit and stopped in a souvenir shop where Kim bought a few things. We also went to an internet café where we made some phone calls.

We enjoyed our breakfasts so much that we decided to go back to the same café for snacks! This time, I had a muffin (blackberry, apple and white chocolate) and Kim had a chocolate hazelnut brownie. There was a small little bird in the café and Kim was laughing at me because I was chasing it around the restaurant trying to catch a picture of it! We were both feeling pretty sleepy and had a little time to kill before we needed to pick up Lynn and Cate, so we just went to the car to take a quick nap. It was only about 15 minutes before we heard from the girls – we were glad to find out that they not only survived the bungy jump, but had a blast doing it! They both got DVDs of their jump, so we pulled over and watched them on my laptop as soon as they got in the car. It made me nervous just to see it on video – I couldn’t even imagine doing it myself. I’m just happy that they had such a great time!
We picked up some supplies at the grocery store to cook a nice dinner for Kim’s birthday. Then we headed out of town to drive to Milford Sound. When we pulled over so that Cate and I could switch off the driving, I jumped up and down a couple of times just to stretch my legs. A car driving by backed up to make sure that we were ok - he saw me jumping and thought we needed help! It was a nice drive, but it started raining really hard. It was also starting to get dark, so we couldn’t really see what we were going past all that well. Once we arrived and got settled into the hostel, we cooked our dinner. We made mashed potatoes, broccoli, and chicken with sweet chili sauce. It was a delicious meal but there were lots of extra mashed potatoes. No one wanted them and I felt bad letting them go to waste so I just ate them and was stuffed afterwards! We rented the game Cranium from reception and played before getting to bed.

South Island: Day 2 - Franz Josef Glacier

2008-05-03T19:58:00.000-07:00

The town of Franz Josef exists pretty much solely because of the fact that it provides access to the Franz Josef Glacier. We had plans to do a full day hike on the glacier. We woke up at 8 to give us time to get ready, have breakfast and pack our lunches. Then we headed over to the glacier guide place. We got all of our gear together: rainjacket, overtrousers, woolen socks, boots, woolen hat and gloves, and a pack containing crampons for our boots. Then, a bus took us as close to the glacier as it could. We walked through the forest for then on a rocky path along a stream (we walked for 3 km even before reaching the glacier!). Once we got there, we all put the crampons on our boots so that it would be easier to walk on the ice. Our group had 10 people in it, plus Bruce, our guide.

Every morning, the guides come out to the glacier and chop steps into parts that are too steep to climb. I can’t imagine how much work that is! There aren’t steps everywhere – just at some parts. Mostly though, you just have to try to stomp while you walk so that your feet stick into ice and you don’t fall. It was raining for a good part of the day, but it didn’t really matter that much. We had so many layers on that my body stayed dry, even in pouring rain. I was actually a pretty comfortable temperature for most of the day. My feet got wet though and did get pretty cold as a result.
We were mostly climbing ice steps for the first hour and a half or so. Then, we began walking on an ice “plateau” where we pretty much just made our own paths, following after the guide. We had lunch on the ice and then continued on our way. By the end of the day, we had gone a good way up the glacier. While the earlier part of the day involved a good amount of steps, we then were walking mostly on ice. We were even given ice picks to use to help steady ourselves for the later part of the climb.
We were not only climbing up, but also had to go though crevasses between the different parts of the glacier. The higher we climbed, the clearer and bluer the ice got. (It is less dirty the farther up you go.) This was a very interesting experience, and I’m very glad that I did it. When else will I get to climb 8 hours on a glacier?!? I do have to admit that it was pretty tiring though! It was interesting that this glacier exists where it does. Franz Josef is one of only 4 glaciers in the world that exists in a temperate climate. It really wasn’t THAT cold on the glacier. The glacier is surrounded by a rainforest, and I even saw a parrot on the ice! Climbing this glacier was definitely a very unique trip.

(That's a parrot...I promise! I know you can't see it very well in this picture though:)
At the end of the day, we were all exhausted and couldn’t wait to shower! Once we were all cleaned up, we decided to treat ourselves to going out for dinner instead of cooking. We decided to try the Indian restaurant in town and shared a couple of entrees. It was a pretty good meal. Back at the hostel, we played a game of Phase 10 before heading to bed.

South Island: Arrival and Day 1 - Christchurch/Arthur's Pass

2008-05-02T21:47:00.001-07:00

Our flight from Auckland to Wellington was at 9 PM Friday night, so we had a shuttle pick the four of us (Kim, Cate, Lynn and I) up from Empire and bring us to the airport. We literally checked in, checked our bags, went through security and were at the gate in less than 10 minutes. Not once were any of us asked for any form of identification, let alone our passports. While we were waiting, we watched “So You Think You Can Dance – Australia” on the TV at the gate, so at least we were entertained. The flight was only an hour and a half, but they served us a snack: ice cream and apples!! Never before have I had ice cream on a plane – I was so excited about it that I asked the flight attendant for a second one and he gave it to me! Once we landed, we just got our luggage and took a taxi to the hostel.

We knew we were staying in a 5-person dorm, but were hoping that maybe the 4 of us would just have it to ourselves. When we entered the room though, we saw someone’s stuff was there: a backpack, a jacket and Herbal Essences shampoo and conditioner. This fact is important because we deduced from it that the person was a girl. We were all talking while we were getting ready for bed ,and Kim and Cate both had these rather detailed impressions of what she would be/look like. When we woke up in the morning, it turned out that we were all very wrong – there was a blond haired guy with a beard sleeping in the other bed! (He stayed asleep while we were getting ready, but it was just a little weird/awkward that we went to sleep just the 4 of us and woke up with a strange man sleeping in the room with us!)

We checked out, but the hostel let us store our luggage while we walked around Christchurch. We went to Cathedral Square, where there is a famous cathedral (and the reason why the city is called Christchurch).

They also have a giant chessboard in the square:

A man from the tourist board approached us to answer a survey and in exchange we got to order something from Starbucks on them! After leaving the square, we walked to see the Botanical Gardens, which are located in a pretty park. It was a beautiful fall day, so we were really enjoying the leaves on the ground and the park in general! We found a monkeybar/swings type thing that we were entertaining ourselves on as well. Then we walked through the Rose Gardens and then headed to pick up the rental car. Cate and I split the driving pretty much equally throughout the trip.

We got our stuff from the hostel and stopped at a grocery store on our way out of town to pick up some supplies. Our drive from Christchurch to Franz Josef (where we were spending the night) took about five hours, including a couple of stops for photos. Even though it was a long drive, it didn’t feel bad at all because we were driving through gorgeous scenery. We drove all the way across the island, along the Canterbury Plains, through the Southern Alps via Arthur’s Pass and then down along the West Coast. The mountains were really pretty, and it was just an overall very enjoyable ride.
We arrived in Franz Josef JUST as it was getting dark and we were getting very hungry. We had a nice dinner of pasta, sauce and garlic bread (plus cheese and crackers while we cooked). Then, we cleaned up and hung around the hostel playing cards. Our 4 person dorm room was ensuite, and we all wanted to shower before going to bed, so we had a little mini Rock-Paper-Scissors Tournament to decide the order we would shower in!

South Island Road Trip!

2008-04-24T23:12:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to let everyone know that I won't be around for the next week to post anything, because I am going to be traveling around the South Island! (This does mean, however, that when I get back there will be several new entries to post!)

New Zealand is comprised of two main islands, the North and the South. Auckland is located on the North Island, as are all of the places that I have visited so far. As beautiful as everything has been here, the South Island is supposed to be even MORE scenic, if that's possible! So, needless to say, I'm really looking forward to this trip.

There are four of us going: Cate, Kim, Lynn and myself. We're flying into Christchurch tonight and then are renting a car for the remainder of the trip. We are trying to cover as much ground as possible and will be doing a lot of driving, making a loop across to the west coast, down to the southern region and then back up to Christchurch along the east coast - all in 8 days. We have some exciting things planned, and I can't wait to tell you all about it!

Love,
Lauren

Taupo and Rotorua: Part Two

2008-04-20T03:21:00.001-07:00

The next day began with a yummy buffet breakfast in the hotel. They had a full English breakfast plus pancakes, fruit, cereal, yogurt, etc. Pretty much, they had every breakfast food you can think of, PLUS some other unusually non-breakfast foods such as fried fish and rice. After breakfast, we got on the bus and headed to our first stop of the day: Te Puia, which is Maori for “The Geyser.” Here, we saw an active geyser that can shoot 30 meters into the air. It was pretty impressive. It’s amazing to me just how many of the things in Rotorua are related to the fact that it is a geothermal spot. (This is probably a good time to mention that Rotorua smells like rotten eggs because of all of the sulfur in the air. You get pretty used to it, but sometimes it just sneaks up on you and you get a very strong whiff all of a sudden.) They also had a “Kiwi House” at Te Puia, so we got to see our first Kiwi bird. Since they are nocturnal animals, they are kept in a house where the time is simulated. When it is noon, the Kiwi birds think that it is midnight - that way the tourists can get to see the birds! We weren’t allowed to take pictures, but they are very funny looking creatures. They are these large brown fluffy things with very long beaks. They can’t fly so they just waddle around.

Our next stop was to the “Agrodome Sheep Show.” In case you are not aware, the sheep to human ratio in New Zealand is 10:1 (the highest per capita of any country in the world), so sheep are a pretty big thing here. We were a little early for the show, so we got to walk around and see all of the sheep up close. I even kissed one! (Kind of gross, I know.) When the show started, they brought all 19 of the different breeds of sheep up on stage. Then, they did a demonstration of a sheep shearing, which was interesting to watch. I felt sort of bad for the sheep though, because he looked so scared afterwards. The guy said that after being sheared, the sheep feel very embarrassed and cold. The guy then did this thing where he was pretending to hold a sheep auction, yelling out in an auctioneer’s voice. He had people raising their hands to “bid” and somehow the next thing I knew I was being called up on stage to pay for the 4 sheep I had supposedly just bought! He told me I owed $700 and when I said I didn’t have any money, he wanted to know how else I could pay. Since I didn’t have much to offer, he asked me to take my jacket off and went through my pockets, where he found my wallet! It was all a joke of course, but I did walk off stage with a little stuffed animal of a sheep.
Next, he asked for 3 volunteers to come onstage to try their hand at milking a cow. Kelly, Cate and one of the Loyola boys got to go up onstage. They all got the hang of it pretty quickly, but seemed a little grossed out by it! After the show was over, we got the chance to hold baby lambs. They were adorable! We had lunch at the Agrodome and ironically enough, they served grilled lamb chops. Believe it or not, this was my first time eating lamb in New Zealand. The lamb chops were actually delicious, but some people were a little unnerved by the fact that we had JUST held lambs and were now eating them (obviously not the same ones though!).

Right after lunch, we headed off to go Zorbing. (Not the BEST planning to have this activity immediately follow lunch, but oh well!) Now, for anyone not familiar with Zorbing, they best way to describe it is a human hamster ball. You roll down a hill with 3 people in a giant inflatable ball which has a little bit of water inside. There is a hole in one side that you squeeze through to get inside. Then you stand up and try to start running (like a hamster wheel) but it is impossible to stay standing. So then you just fall down and are sloshing around in the bottom. I went down with Kelly and Kim and we were pretty much just laughing like crazy the whole way down. This was definitely a unique experience to say the least!
Next, we went to Rainbow Springs, which was a zoo-type place with fish and birds. I was exhausted by this time of the day and to be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to what the tour guide was telling us about the different types of fish. We did get to see another Kiwi bird though. Seeing these birds twice in one day could definitely be considered a rarity because even though they are the national bird, they are not spotted very often. Unfortunately afterwards, we had to sit through another lecture, about Maori tourism this time. I felt bad for the lecturer, because the things he was telling us about the Maori culture were mostly things we had heard numerous times already, and everyone was pretty bored, myself included. After the lecture, we were able to go back to the hotel and had about an hour and a half before dinner. Most of us put this time to excellent use by taking a much needed nap!

When we went downstairs for dinner, we were met with a huge array of food. Most of it was actually quite good, especially the desserts. We stuffed ourselves again – it was hard not to on this trip, since all of our meals were already paid for! After dinner, we headed over to the Polynesian Spa, which has 35 different hot mineral pools. It was really fun just relaxing in the hot water. The different pools were supposed to be good for different ailments. We spent most of our time in the one designed to relieve joint and muscle pain. I have to say that it was a very relaxing experience, despite the fact that we all smelled disgustingly of sulfur when we were done.

When we had had enough, we headed back to shower off. Then we all got ready to go out to celebrate Timm’s birthday. We hung around for a while listening to Nick and Timm play the guitar and bongo before going to a bar called “The Grumpy Mole” – Timm’s choice! The final day was pretty low key. We filled up on breakfast before heading to the Skyline Gondola – a cable car ride which afforded a beautiful view over Lake Rotorua and the surrounding area. The highlight was that Loyola paid for one luge ride per person. We got to ride on a track a little ways down the mountain and then take a ski lift back up. The luge was similar to alpine slides that I have been on, except the track was flatter and wider and you got to steer! It was pretty challenging at times, because you definitely felt like you were going to flip over coming around some of the curves (and one girl from our group DID wipe out)! It was tons of fun though, and we all opted to pay for a second ride so that we could try out the advanced track (because you had to go down the intermediate one your first time).
We had our final buffet meal – lunch with a gorgeous view. Then we headed back down in the cable cars, and boarded the bus for our ride back. Linda the bus driver dropped us off at the top of the hill (NOT out front of our apartment building) so we were all traipsing down the street with our luggage. I imagine it was quite a funny sight! Well, that concludes our trip. It was pretty sad to think that we won’t have any more trips with ALL of Loyola (not to mention the fact that it was our last free trip!) But I’m sure it won’t be the last of our adventures! Right now, we’ve passed the 2 month mark. It’s hard to believe all of the amazing things I have seen and done in that time.

Taupo and Rotorua: Part One

2008-04-20T02:23:00.001-07:00

We had our third (and final) Loyola-sponsored trip this weekend. Essentially, we went on a four day trip to Lake Taupo and Lake Rotorua and didn’t have to spend any of our own money – so you can guess that it was a pretty good time! So good, in fact, that I am going to split this up into two posts. Here goes part one!

Bright and early Thursday morning, we all met in the lobby of Empire to board our coach bus. We met Linda (the very masculine bus driver who takes her job and her bus extremely seriously) and Susanna (the 60-something year old woman who was to be our coordinator for this trip of 35 college students). So right from the start, the stage was set for an interesting trip! We set out on our way towards Taupo, stopping along the way in Waitomo to visit glowworm caves. (These caves were in the same town as where I went caving about a month ago.) We were supposed to be able to take a boat ride in the dark to view the glowworms, but unfortunately, the water levels were too high. So basically, we just took a walking tour through the cave which, I have to admit, wasn’t really all that exciting. Afterwards, we went to a café where we had the first of the many buffet meals on this trip.

The glowworm caves were the only attraction of Day 1. We just continued on to our hotel and checked in. No, I did not forget the “s” in “hostel” – I really did mean to say “hotel.” Loyola put us up in hotels for the weekend, which was an absolutely wonderful treat!

Before dinner, we took a walk down by the lake:

We were given a sit-down dinner this first night, and it turned out to be delicious. The starter was tomato soup, which was creamy and reminded me of vodka sauce. Then, we had the choice of pork, chicken or fish. After much debate, I decided to order the pork. (And I’m serious about the debate part – the people at my table can attest to the fact that choosing my main course was an agonizing decision for me!) In the end though, I was very happy with my choice. The pork was served in a marsala-type sauce over mushrooms and kumara, which is similar to sweet potatoes. I thoroughly enjoyed it! For dessert, we had the choice of blueberry cheesecake or lemon-lime tart. This time, I made the wrong decision, choosing the cheesecake over the tart - but I still got to taste both! After dinner, we all hung out in one hotel room, until Linda came over and told us that we were being too loud. So we decided to walk the 45 minutes into town - far, I know but hey, you only live once!

The next morning, we got up for breakfast and then headed for a ride on the Huka Jet. (Note: this is the first of several occasions on this trip where we eat a meal before doing something rather active!) The Huka Jet was a half-hour ride on a specially designed boat that travels at a speed of 75-80 km/hour and does 360 degree spins. The boat goes along a river warmed by geothermal activity and travels to the base of Huka Falls, an impressive waterfall. Enough water comes over the falls to fill an Olympic sized pool every 3-4 seconds! The spins on the boat were pretty fun and you got a little wet – but it didn’t really matter because the water was warm! After the ride, we then got back on the bus and drove to where we could get some photos of the Huka Falls from land. We saw two people kayak over the falls, which I would consider quite daring!

We continued on to Waimangu Thermal Valley where we enjoyed a lunch of soup, bread and cheese at the café before heading out on a walking tour. We were right over a geothermal hot spot and hiked down into the valley. Essentially, we were inside of a huge crater. It was an interesting hike, passing hot springs, mud pools, lakes and streams all created because of the geothermal activity in the area. We had a guide with us, explaining things as we went along.

Kim, me, Kelly and Cate in front of a steaming lake!

After the walk, we drove to Rotorua and checked into our new hotel. The rooms here were really nice and almost all of us were staying in the same hallway which turned out to be a lot of fun. We had a chance to shower and get settled in, but then we had to get back on the bus to attend some lecture about tourism. The lecturer wasn’t that bad, but it was kind of weird that we had to go in the first place – we came to the conclusion that Loyola must have gotten some sort of a deal on this trip by promising that we would all listen to this talk! It was all about the tourism life cycle and different marketing techniques, and just seemed out of context with the rest of what we were doing.

For dinner, we visited a marae. where we were able to participate in the traditional Maori way of cooking called hangi. (Well, we didn't actually participate in the cooking itself, just the eating!) A hangi is where all of the food is cooked in a pit in the earth. Before being allowed to enter the marae, we of course had to go through the customary welcoming ceremony. Then we were entertained with song and dance, including a performance of the haka (the traditional war dance). They also had 6 of the guys from our group go up on stage and learn how to do some of the haka, which was pretty funny to watch. After the entertainment, we went next door for the main event: dinner. Everything was delicious and I think that everyone left the hangi stuffed to the max. We had pork, chicken, beef, vegetables and potatoes all cooked in the ground, which gave the food an interesting smoky flavor and was cooked to perfection. There was also salad, coleslaw, corn, delicious stuffing, gravy, and homemade bread. For dessert, there was fruit, cake slices, trifle, and some type of custard. The custard was unsweetened though, so we were all making our own concoctions by adding sugar and mixing everything up into a big mush! The whole hangi dinner was definitely very enjoyable. This was a family marae (not very commercial) and we were the only guests that night, so it really felt like an authentic cultural experience to me. That night after dinner, we went back and all hung around the hotel again.

My dinner table - Dana, Nick, Timm, Ed, Brian, me and TK:

The pit that our food was cooked in:

Skydiving? Tongariro?

2008-04-14T21:06:00.000-07:00

This week is "Mid-Semester Break" and most of our friends are using the time to travel around the South Island. I'm going to be going to the South Island in two weeks, but I still wanted to do something over break. So 5 of us (Kim, Kelly, Cate, Lynn, and I) planned a trip to go to Taupo and to Tongariro. Taupo is the skydiving capital of the world and though I was not planning on participating, some of the other girls did want to go skydiving. Tongariro is a national park containing some impressive mountains, including the mountain that was used to film Mount Doom in Lord of the Rings. There is a hike, "Tongariro Crossing," which is supposedly the best dayhike in all of New Zealand, so we wanted to do that as well.

We picked up the rental car early on Saturday morning and drove the three and a half hours to the hostel in Taupo. It was a nice drive, but when we got to the hostel, everyone was pretty tired. This hostel was very nice, and we had a room with just the 5 of us and an ensuite bathroom! The girls who were going skydiving were going to be picked up at the hostel at 3:00, and we had some time, so we decided to lay down for naps. We were all woken up at 2 by a knock on our door, being told that the car was here to pick us up! So everyone groggily, but quickly, got ready to go. It was a limo that came to pick us up, and we all got to go to the airport, even if we weren't actually going skydiving. I was glad because I wanted to come along to see and for moral support!

Kelly, Cate and Lynn were the ones who were going skydiving, and so obviously had a bit of paperwork to do. This is one place where New Zealand is completely different from the United States. At home, there are all sorts of safety precautions and everything. Here, they pretty much just make you sign a form saying that you can't sue them if anything happens to you. So as we watch the girls sign the form, the tension started to build! I think reality was beginning to set in that they were about to jump out of an airplane at 15,000 feet! When we arrived at the place, we all got to watch the DVD of a girl who had just gone. I have to say that as I watched the video, I only became more certain that I had made the right decision in choosing NOT to skydive. The view was beautiful, but I think I would have been scared out of my mind. The only reason I would really have wanted to go would have been so that I could say "I went skydiving!" and for me, since it wasn't something that I personally wanted to do, it wasn't worth the money or the risk. BUT, that's just me! While watching the DVD made me scared, the girls who were actually going got excited - so that's a good thing!

They got all geared up and then flew off in a bright pink plane! Kim and I watched from the ground and we actually SAW each of them as little dots appear one by one. Then, once the parachutes opened, we could see them even better. They were in complete free fall for a little over a minute! Once all three of them were safely back on the ground, we got to hear all about it. They all agreed that it was the coolest thing they had ever done in their lives - so I'm happy that they enjoyed it AND survived!

We decided to go out for a celebratory dinner afterwards, and walked in to town to find a place. Everything was pretty expensive and the town seemed kind of dead. We wound up at a little Japanese place where we got chicken terriyaki. After dinner, we went to the supermarket to get some basic supplies before heading back to the hostel. When Kelly and I were putting our groceries in the fridge, we made an amazing discovery: there were some games in the common room, and better yet, they had "Cranium." (For anyone not familiar, this is a boardgame which I love, that is kind of like a Charades, Pictionary, Name that Tune, trivia questions, Wheel of Fortune, and more all rolled into one wonderful game!) So we brought that back to our room and played two rounds of it before heading to sleep.

The next morning, we tried to decide what to do before driving to Tongariro. Our next hostel was only about an hour and a half away, so we wanted to do something in the morning before heading out. We decided to drive along the river, where we could get a nice view of Huka Falls:

Then, we headed along to visit the "Craters of the Moon," an interesting natural site. Because of the thermal activity below New Zealand, these interesting craterlike holes formed. There is steam coming out from the ground and bubbling mud pools. There is a track that winds along and takes about an hour, so we decided to go for the walk. I'm really glad we did, because it turned out to be a rather unique experience.

Our next random stop was a visit to "Huka Prawn Park," a prawn farm with some interesting activities. There was a restaurant there, which we did not actually eat at. We went up to look at the menu, and the hostess started to seat us. We told her that we were just looking at the menu for now, and she said rather rudely, "Well then could you stand back there so you are not in the way of other customers." So we just used the bathrooms and decided NOT to eat there! (To be honest, we wouldn't have eaten there anyway - our budgets couldn't quite afford the prawn dishes - but it felt better to pretend that we were leaving because of her rudeness rather than our lack of funds!)

We DID however, give Huka Prawn Park some business by participating in the exciting activity of "Killer Prawn Golf." Basically, we purchased a bucket of golf balls like you would at a driving range, and hit them into the prawn pools! It really looked like a driving range too! There were prizes for getting a ball into a certain ring (but, no surprise, none of us won). We were not really expert golfers by any means - we got all excited when one of us actually hit the ball - but we had fun trying anyway.

After the golf, we went to the Honey Hive, where we sampled different types of honey products, none of which I really liked! But we did try some wine made from Kiwifruit. (Yes, you must be very specific here in New Zealand when talking about Kiwis. The word "kiwi" by itself refers to the people, "kiwifruit" is the fruit, and "kiwi bird" is the national bird). So, just for clarification, the wine we got was made from a fruit, not a New Zealander or a bird!

We drove towards our hostel in Tongariro, seeing some very nice scenery along the way.
When we went to check in, we were told that we might want to reconsider our plans, since we wouldn't be able to do the hike the next day. The weather was supposed to be rainy, but worse than that, they were expecting 75 km/hr winds. Since part of the hike involves climbing down the edge of a crater, you are very exposed to the wind and the woman told us it would just be too dangerous. We were all really disappointed and kind of thrown off of our plans. We sat around for a bit, trying to figure out what we could do instead. We decided we would stay the night, and then figure out what to do for the morning. But once we got into the room (which was pretty nice, by the way!) and actually starting discussing our options, we decided that it would probably make more sense just to drive back to Auckland that night. There wasn’t anything in particular that we really wanted to do (there’s not much to do around Tongariro OTHER than hike), so we would be just waking up and driving back. So we decided to save the money on a night of accommodation. Here's what we WOULD have been climbing:
The drive back took about 5 hours. We stopped for dinner at a Chinese restaurant in Hamilton. The place was pretty full, and almost everyone eating there was Asian, so we figured that was a good sign. It turned out to be mediocre at best though. We were all pretty hungry though, so it didn’t matter much! When we arrived back in Auckland, we now had to figure out where to park the rental car, which was quite an ordeal since it was POURING rain at this point. We could park it overnight on the street, but we would either have to move it or put money in the meter starting at 8 AM. So we decided to try the parking lot nearby, but the machines weren’t working and we wound up going back to our spot on the street! When we got back into Empire, wet and tired, we were all glad to get a good night’s sleep.

We got up the next morning and decided that we would take advantage of having the rental car. So we drove to the aquarium, which was a nice indoor activity (since the weather was still gross). It was a cool aquarium, but the highlight was the Antarctica exhibit. They had a whole bunch of penguins in a simulated environment with water and snow. Plus, they have a little vehicle which they call a “Snowcat,” where you can ride through the exhibit, right up next to the penguins! They were so cute! That night, we had a nice dinner and movie night. We made tricolor pasta and had our Kiwifruit wine. It was a wonderful cozy night and a great end to our trip!

White Water Rafting!

2008-04-13T04:31:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday (the day after we went canyoning), we went white water rafting on the Wairoa River, near Rotorua. It was an incredible experience to say the least! (Sorry, but I don't have any pictures of this trip.) It was a good drive from Auckland (close to 4 hours), but there was nice scenery along the way and most people napped/listened to their iPods on the drive. We did make one bathroom/snack stop along the way.

When we arrived, we got into our wetsuits which, as the guides told us, were “pre-moistened” from the previous group. Before coming to New Zealand, I have never put on a wetsuit, and today marked the 5th time I’ve been in one (not counting the fact that when we were at the Great Barrier Reef, we got in and out of them 3 times in one day)! Putting on “wetties” has become somewhat of a joke with our group, because the guides always size you up and hand you your wetsuit – so you never know until you try it on whether it is going to be enormous on you, or practically impossible to get on. Today we also put on helmets, booties and lifejackets and then boarded the bus to bring us right to the river.

As we were listening to the guides’ instructions before getting in the rafts, I was starting to get really excited and a little nervous as well. In addition to being taught the different ways to paddle and the different directions we might receive out on the water, we were also given a crash course in what to do should we, or any of our fellow rafters, fall out. I think the scariest instructions were on what to do if the whole boat flipped over and we were all underneath it. Anyway, I tried not to think about that possibility! There were 13 of us from Loyola on this trip, but we were split up into 3 different rafts. Rich and Dana were with some other people, I was in a boat with 6 girls (myself, Kelly, Cate, Kim, Lynn and Caitlin Henzler) and then the other boat had 5 people (Jed, TK, Gennady, Steph, and Caitlin Burke). Before we left, everyone was joking around with us, saying how our boat was going to be trouble, and making bets on which of us weren’t going to make it back. Because of this, our guide gave us the nickname of “wahine toa” (which mean “the brave girls in Maori). This became out team cheer and after every rapid, we all raised our paddles and yelled out “wahine toa!”

White water rafting was SO much fun! It was definitely a little scary at times, but I really enjoyed it a lot and would love to do it again sometime. The river that we went on was a Grade 5 river (which is the highest grade that you can raft commercially) and this particular river is only open 26 days out of the year, when water is released from a dam upstream. So there were some pretty challenging rapids to navigate through and some pretty decent drops. The largest vertical waterfall that we went down was 4 meters, but some of the other waterfalls were actually more intense because they had more volume and were rockier.

We were out on the river for about two and a half hours total. Stevie, our guide, would instruct us on how we were planning on navigating the upcoming rapids (whether we would be paddling at certain spots, if we would have to all get down really low, or if we all needed to move to one side of the raft, etc.). Then we would go through the rapids/waterfalls and it was really exciting! Stevie would call out instructions and we would all do what he said, hoping that we would make it through. It really was important that we did what he said, so that we would enter into the rapids at the right spot and in the right direction. Once we cleared the rapids, we would hang out in the calm sections of the river and watch the rafts behind us go through. This part was actually really cool, because as I watched the other groups come down, I was just thinking to myself, “I can’t believe I just did that!”

We went over some Grade 3 and 4 rapids, with names such as “Mother’s Nightmare,” in preparation for the two Grade 5 rapids coming up. It was tough and very scary, but we made it down all in one piece. Then, we paddled over to a calm spot where we tied our raft up to a rock. Then, we had the option (which I took) of climbing back up a cliff to a point where we could see the other groups come down the waterfall as well. It was kind of tough to get up, because the rock was completely vertical and there were no footholds. So we had to hold onto a rope and pretty much pull ourselves up. BUT….the view was well worth it! We watched a couple of rafts come down and try to navigate the tricky rapids. On one of the boats, two people fell out on the way down.

Then, along came the other boat with all Loyola people in it (the people who were giving us grief before we left). They seemed to be having a little trouble navigating around the rocks and when they got up to the waterfall, they were actually turned around, heading down the waterfall backwards. We were kind of laughing at them, since they were teasing US about how we would do. But then, their boat totally flipped over and everyone was gone! This was WHILE they were going down the waterfall, not even that the boat flipped when it landed at the bottom. We didn’t see anyone for a couple of seconds (we found out later that they were all trapped under the raft) and then finally we spotted some heads. The looks on their faces were of sheer panic. Everyone scrambled to get back on a raft. Some of them were able to get back up, but others were getting pulled downstream. Finally, everyone was pulled to safety and it was determined that everyone was ok. Talking to people afterwards, the consensus seemed to be that while it was terrifying at the time, they were actually glad that they had the experience.

To get back off of this cliff we were standing on, we all had to jump down into the water, since it was impossible to get back down the way we had come up. We each just jumped off the cliff, one by one, and then the people on the rafts pulled us back on. We then continued down the river through all the different kinds of rapids. This was such a fun experience and I’m SO happy that I signed up for it. Wairoa River is one of New Zealand’s most exciting rafting rivers and now I’ve done it!

Canyoning!

2008-04-09T21:29:00.000-07:00

A group of 11 of us spent the day on Saturday canyoning in the Waitekere Ranges, about 40 minutes outside of Auckland. I’m sure you are probably wondering what “canyoning” is, because I myself didn’t really know too much about it until after I did it! Well, to sum it up, we basically walked through the forest UPHILL for a good little while and then followed the river back downhill. (This, of course, required jumping down waterfalls, swimming through pools and wading through the water.)

So, we were picked up at the university at 10 and then we drove out to some shed near where we were going to start our trek. We all had on our bathing suits, but we needed to get helmets, thermal shirts, booties and shoes for our feet. We gathered up our harnesses and wetsuits, and carried them with us so that we didn’t have to actually wear them for our hike. (We would have just been way too hot.) Keep in mind though, that this meant that we were hiking through the woods wearing a long sleeve shirt, no pants (just our bathing suit bottoms), a helmet, booties and funny looking shoes, with wetsuits tied as “backpacks” on our backs. It really was a pretty funny sight.

Our uphill climb lasted about 40 minutes and then we were finally at the river where we would begin our journey. We all jumped off a big cliff and into a pool of water. It was deep enough that we were allowed to do whatever kind of jump we wanted, so some people got pretty creative with their flips and funny jumps. (I however, looked super lame jumping off holding my nose every time, but I got too much water in my nose otherwise, so I just played it simple.) Then we swam through the water to the next waterfall and jumped off that ledge. It pretty much worked this way for most of the day. We would wade or swim through the water, depending on how deep it was, until we got to another spot where we would jump back in! Some of the jumps were pretty high and we had to have specific instructions on WHERE to jump so that we didn’t hit a rock or anything. Here's Cate jumping!:

At one of the jumps, they had all of the guys go together and then all of the girls. We decided to jump like ballerinas! (I'm the only person with a blue wetsuit, so I'm pretty easy to pick out!)There were two spots where we could not jump from, so we had to abseil/rappel down. I’m terrible at judging distance, but I can tell you that this was a pretty big drop! For the first half, it was mostly rock, but then it turned into the waterfall part, which was pretty slippery because of the moss and stuff growing. My feet slipped a big while I was making my way down and I swung out along the rocks. But Cate was my “safety” from down below and held my rope nice and tight for me until I got back on track! The second time that we rappelled down, the waterfall was much more vertical and slippery. Surprisingly though, I did much better that time, making it down with no mishaps.

Nick abseiling down the rock:

In addition to jumping, swimming and wading, we also got to do a couple of slides. The first one was pretty small, so they sent us down backwards, headfirst! (This is Kelly going down the backwards slide.)

The next ones were larger and longer, so we went down them forwards, but one had a pretty good drop off at the end, so you went flying into the water. Here I am going down the slide:Then there was a spot where we had to be lowered down into the pool, because it was too high and also too shallow to jump. So we sat in our harnesses while the guide lowered us down the waterfall. When I got towards the bottom though, my rope started to swing and I smacked into the rock. My hand is pretty sore (not a major injury by ANY means, but it’s just a little bruised). I also fell several times during the day while we were walking, because you couldn’t really see the rocks in the water to know how good your footing was. Since some of the rocks were slippery, or the water would be shallow and then suddenly drop off, I fell on several occasions.

It was a very fun day, but I was definitely very happy when we were told we could remove our wetsuits! Mine was SUPER tight on me and was very difficult to get on and off (especially once it was wet). After rinsing off and getting out of our suits, we trekked back up the hill, again sporting our interesting outfits, just a bit more exhausted this time. This was definitely quite an experience!

New Post

2008-04-07T05:21:00.000-07:00

Hello! So I do actually have a new post called "Maori Culture Weekend," which is about our second Loyola-sponsored trip.

HOWEVER...I started typing the post before I finished putting up all the Australia info. So when I finally finished up with Australia and went to post the entry about our Maori weekend, the entry got placed out of order.

I can't figure out yet how to fix it, but hopefully I'll get around to it at some point.

In the meantime though, if you scroll down, you can view this post I am referring to. It towards the bottom of the page, in between Australia Day 2 and Day 3.

Enjoy,
Lauren

Australia: Last Day - Cape Tribulation

2008-04-05T04:04:00.000-07:00

For our final day in Australia, we took a trip up to Cape Tribulation, which is where the rainforest and the reef meet. We didn't want to have to deal with the hassle of renting a car and driving ourselves, so we just booked a day tour through our hostel. We were picked up in a 24 person van/bus and then rode around picking up the other passengers before leaving town. On the drive up, we rode all along the coast and saw some beautiful scenery. Here's a photo I took at one of the picture stops:

It's worth noting that by this time in our trip, we were pretty exhausted and wiped out, so we both dozed off on the bus at several points during the day. Our first stop was in a small town where we went to a cafe and had the option of buying something to eat or drink. Kelly and I walked around the town and went into 5 other cafes searching for a muffin or some type of snack. But of course, just to go along with how things had been for this whole trip, since we were actually LOOKING for muffins, none of the 6 cafes we went to had any. So, we just got iced coffees at the cafe where everyone else was before we hit the road again.

Then next stop was at the Daintree River Crossing. We took a river boat cruise for about an hour, on a search for crocodiles.

We actually did spot a few and it was kind of scary being so close to them in their natural habitat. (And the fact that the guide was telling us all of his stories about close calls he'd had over the years with him just narrowly escaping crocodile attacks didn't help too much!) But we did make it across the river safely, since I am still here to tell you about it.

Our next stop was at a rainforest, to walk on a short trail through it. At this point though, my coffee had run through me and I had to go to the bathroom really badly! I looked on the map at the start of the trail, and it showed a bathroom just past the car park. So the group started along on the trail, and I said I'd catch up. Well, I walked up and down the road, searching for these bathrooms, which were no where to be found! I did find a small clearing right around where the bathrooms SHOULD have been, so I think that they really were gone (not just that I couldn't locate them). So, I had no choice but to make my own little trail to a hopefully secluded spot in the forest, where I could use the "bathroom" before my bladder exploded! I then caught up with the group and we saw some pretty interesting trees and other such flora in the rainforest.

All those knobby looking things on the are exposed roots of the trees:

We all piled back into the van and continued our drive up to Cape Tribulation. We stopped at a hostel-resort type area called "PK's Jungle Village" where we were supposed to have lunch. To be honest, it was pretty gross food though, so Kel and I wound up going to the little shop there to find some other source of food. We ate our "lunch" as we walked along a trail through the forest. Never before have I emerged from a rainforest right on to a beach. The scenery was just beautiful. Now, neither of us were wearing watches, but we knew we were supposed to meet back at the bus at 2. As we were heading back we were kind of just strolling along, thinking we had plenty of time. Just to get an idea though, we stopped and asked someone what time it was and discovered that it was already 2:20! We ran back to the bus to find everyone else sitting waiting. At least they didn't leave without us, but it was kind of embarrassing.

At the next spot, along our drive back, the driver/guide said to everyone, "And for the two girls without watches, please make sure you stick with me or with someone else who has a watch, because we can't wait this time." So, we made extra sure that we were back at the bus on time! This stop was just a short one anyway. We were at a place called Mossman Gorge. It was a short walk along a stream/river to a place where some people went swimming, but Kelly and I just took the opportunity to write some postcards. Our final stop along the way back was at a town called Port Douglass. It was a nice looking town, a little more upscale but somewhat similar to Cairns. We basically just walked around there for a little bit. When we got back to Cairns, we were exhausted from the day. We checked out a couple of restaurants, but ultimately decided just to go back to "The Banana Leaf," the Asian restaurant we had eaten at the other night. Since both of us had enjoyed out meals there so much, we decided that we would just eat there again instead of risking trying a new place and having a mediocre meal our last night. We got back to the hostel, packed and went to bed.

The next morning we went to the shopping mall for breakfast again (at a different place this time!) We both had omelettes which were very good. Since we were catching the bus to the airport from the center of town, and we had to check out of our hostel in the morning, we had to bring our suitcases with us. I can only imagine how funny we looked, rolling our suitcases not only down the streets of Cairns, but also through the mall! Everything went smoothly in terms of getting to the airport and our flight. We had an interesting experience on the plane. (I'm hoping that the fact that Kelly and I somehow always seem to have these "interesting" encounters is becoming less surprising to you by now!) There was a little 2-year-old Maori boy sitting a couple of rows ahead of us on the plane. When Kel got up to go to the bathroom, he ran over to her and started running down the aisle. Kelly picked him up and brought him back to his mom, but somehow the mom thought it would be great if he came and played with us, since we had an extra seat in our row! So, we spent about an hour of the flight entertaining this little Maori boy, and I think he probably entertained us about as much as we did him. Kelly and I each tried on different occasions to bring him back to his mom, but he was holding on to us and would not let go. (We eventually did get him to go back to his seat, but then he kept popping up and yelling back to us, "Hey!" until we would look up at him!)

Anyway, the plane ride also gave us some great aerial views of the Great Barrier Reef:

And the sunset was pretty cool as well:

When we finally got back to Empire Apartments, it felt really great to be back in Auckland. I am so happy that we decided to take this trip together because it really was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Kelly and I will have lots of stories and funny adventures to remember from our Easter trip to Australia.

Australia Day 6: Great Barrier Reef!

2008-03-31T16:01:00.000-07:00

Maybe this is just me, but when I think of Australia, 3 places come to mind immediately: Sydney, the Outback, and the Great Barrier Reef. I was more than excited to see the Great Barrier Reef, so we booked a day cruise which would take us out to where we could access the reef. I'm not exactly sure what I had in mind, but this was definitely a little different. You can't see the reef unless you go underwater. You can see how the water is different shades depending on the depth and how close you are to the coral, but without looking underneath, you are not really going to SEE the Great Barrier Reef. Kelly and I wanted to see as much as we could, so we signed up for an introductory scuba dive!

Our boat had about 70 people or so on it. The boat left at 8:30 and got back around 4:30, stopping at 3 different sites. It took a little over an hour to get to the first site and then the boat just anchored in what seemed like the middle of nowhere - just out in the Coral Sea somewhere. On the ride out, we watched an instructional video outlining some basic scuba diving skills. Each dive instructor could take a maximum of 4 people on each dive. For some reason though, Kelly and I had our dive instructor all to ourselves, which was really nice! It was like we were on our own personal dive.

Anyway, I'm jumping ahead of myself. Our dive was not until the 2nd site. At the first site, we just went snorkeling. It started raining for a bit just as we were getting into the water, but that actually made for a really cool experience! Everyone got all geared up with wetsuits, masks, fins and a snorkel-breathing thing (I actually don't know what that's called!).

Then we just went off a platform on the back of the boat and walked right into the water. The water was really warm, but a little rough at the first spot. Since neither of us had ever snorkeled before, we were having a little trouble getting the hang of how to breathe. Because the water was rough, it kept getting into the pipe of the snorkel. We didn't see all that much of the reef at the first site, because we stayed pretty close to the boat.

BUT....at the next site, we went SCUBA DIVING!!!! Seriously, this was definitely one of the coolest, if not THE coolest thing I have ever done. Our instructor Sam got us all suited up, put dive weights on us, attached our air tanks, etc. Then, we were told to walk over to the edge of the platform and just jump in! I was really excited at this point. We then headed down a couple of feet just to practice the skills we needed to know. We practiced how to get water out of our goggles if they filled up, and how to take the regulator (the thing you breathe from) out of your mouth and switch to a different one. Everyone has two regulators hooked up to their air tank, so that if something happens to yours, you can use the spare regulator on someone else's tank.

So, we had to practice taking the regulator OUT of our mouths and then putting the other regulator in. At this point, I was getting a little freaked out by the whole situation. I think that it was finally sinking in that we were UNDERWATER, breathing out of a tank. Kelly swam up because she was starting to get a little nervous as well. When we went back up to the surface, Sam told us just to try to breathe slower, that we were breathing too heavily because we were nervous. So we went back down to finish up the skills. At this point, I was breathing a little through my nose (which you are not supposed to do) and I got some water in my nose. Then, I had to do the skill where you take the regulator out of your mouth, and I somehow got some water in my mouth. This is when I really started to freak out because I felt like I could not breathe. I had to go back up to the surface again. I was so scared that I was telling Sam, "I really don't know if I can do this." I was pretty close to backing out, but I knew that I would have been so disappointed if I didn't have this experience. Sam and Kelly convinced me to try again and I just concentrated very hard on steadying my breath.
We made it down. And it was SO worth it.

If I had missed out on this amazing opportunity, I would have been so disappointed. I have never experienced anything like this before. I could not believe we were actually scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef, swimming past beautifully colored tropical fish and coral.

We were just so close to everything!

Kelly and I had rented an underwater camera so that we could capture all of this...and I think that was one of the best investments I've ever made! We just snapped away, taking TONS of pictures to remember this once in a lifetime experience. (I know I have more pictures on this post than usual, but it was just so hard to narrow down and choose which photos to use!) At one point, Sam had Kelly and I kneel down on the sand at the bottom. Then he took the camera from me, so that he could take some pictures of both of us.

After the dive, we went back up onto the boat for lunch. Kelly and I were just sitting there in absolute shock. We just kept saying to each other "We just went scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef." Now that we had the hang of how to breathe underwater, when we got to the third site, we were pros at snorkeling! We were able to keep our heads down for a long while at a time and this site was perfect for snorkeling. There were some really shallow areas where the coral was REALLY close, so we got some great pictures here as well! Once we finally got back on the boat to head to shore, we dried off and sat looking through the camera at the pictures we had taken. We were so excited to bring the camera back to the rental place and get the pictures put onto a CD! We dropped the camera off, went to dinner, and then went back to pick up our pictures. Luckily, there was a computer in the shop, where you could view your pictures. As we looked through all of them (we did get some good shots!) we were still amazed at what we had done.

This was definitely our most exciting day yet! We had SO much fun and it was an absolutely incredible experience.

Australia Day 5: Easter in Cairns

2008-03-31T03:00:00.000-07:00

Our morning began with our grocery store breakfast consisting of cereal, fruit and yogurt. I have to tell you about the cereal though, because it was quite interesting. We had golden honey shredded wheat, which sounds relatively normal. It was actually pretty strange though because it was not honey-flavored shredded wheat. Instead, it was regular shredded wheat with a honey filling in the center. It didn't have a bad taste, but the consistency was really weird because the wheat part would get soggy in the milk, but the honey center stayed really gummy. Neither of us were big fans of it.

Ok...enough about cereal! This was Easter for us, so we wanted to go to church. We had looked one up and walked there. We had on skirts and dresses and were all set for a nice Easter mass. However, as it turned out, it wasn't really the most enjoyable experience for us. First of all, it didn't feel at all like Easter...there were no flowers and the church was not decorated in any special way. The microphone and sound system was terrible and we could not hear a word of what the priest was saying. But on top of that, it was so unbearly hot in the church. Everyone was dripping with sweat and fanning themselves with the missalette. (Some people even brought their own Chinese fans with them!) The heat and humidity were just so intense that unfortunately I could not concentrate on anything other than how incredibly uncomfortable I was.

After mass, we walked our sweaty selves to the nearest nice hotel, where we hung out in the lobby to benefit from some of the A/C. I realize that we have done a good amount of mooching on this trip! When we were finally cooled off and rehydrated, we walked along the Esplanade, which is the street that runs along the water.

Now, there is not actually a beach in Cairns. There's a boardwalk (not the kind with rides...just a promendade) and that ends at a really cool looking saltwater lagoon which is open to the public for swimming. By this point, both of us were getting a little cranky from being so hungry, hot and tired. So we decided to remedy one of those issues by stopping for lunch at a little cafe. Next came the relief for complaint #2: we stopped at an internet cafe which happened to be air conditioned. Then finally, we walked back to the hostel for naps to deal with the third issue.

After our naps, we were both in better spirits and headed back into town to find a place to have our Easter dinner. We decided to walk out by the marina, where there were a bunch of restaurants looking out over the water. We decided on a Thai fish restaurant which was delicious! We shared an appetizer of crab and caper bruschetta and then had salmon as our main meal. We then walked around town a bit more and stopped to get dessert! It was a very enjoyable Easter dinner.

Australia Day 4: Cairns Tropical Zoo!

2008-03-31T00:45:00.001-07:00

Neither of us slept very well our first night in Cairns, and since we were both awake, we decided to just get up, even though our alarm had not yet gone off. Once we were ready, we went to reception to check-in (we didn't do this last night because it was so late). The woman at the desk was really friendly and helped us book our cruise to the Great Barrier Reef and a day trip up to Cape Tribulation!

When we left the hostel, we walked towards town and stopped in Cairns Central, a large shopping mall, where we got some breakfast. We had a nice breakfast of scrambled eggs, mushrooms and toast, but we were cracking up because we were sitting at a table in the middle of the mall. Our table was literally right outside of the main department store! We took advantage of the A/C in the mall and used the bathrooms, ATMs and phones there as well!

Then we headed into the center of Cairns to catch the bus out to Cairns Tropical Zoo. It was about a 20 minute bus ride through some very pretty scenery - it drove along the coast. So we spent the afternoon at the zoo, which focused on animals native to this area and Australia. Some of the things we saw included wombats, various birds and snakes, crocodiles, red pandas and lemurs.
(This bird talked and said "hello" to us!)

This is the red panda:

And here's a koala in a tree!

Plus, we got to feed and pet kangaroos! There was a whole gated off area where the kangaroos were free to roam around. And we just got to walk around that area with them! It was so cool just being so close to them...not seeing them from behind a cage, but actually petting and feeding them.

They were smaller than I imagined and their faces look a lot like deer. We even saw one that had a joey in its pouch (you can see the feet and tail sticking out and also see the large lump behind her legs):
So the kangaroos were pretty cool....but the absolute highlight of the visit was getting to have our picture taken with a baby koala! We actually got to HOLD the baby koala and they were so cute!! Kelly and I were so excited about this. They were just the most adorable, docile animals! After the zoo, we rode the bus back to Cairns where we went to the grocery store to pick up some breakfast supplies for the week. We also got some stuff for lunch and went to the local fruit market as well. We stopped in Cairns Central again on our walk back to the hostel, just to cool off and sit for a minute. Back at the hostel, we tried to use the internet, but it was REALLY slow. We then hung out in our room for a bit, doing some reading for school and taking naps.

We left the hostel again later on to go back into town for dinner. We looked at a couple of menus, and then decided to eat at "The Banana Leaf." (I know you might be surprised that I would eat as a restaurant with banana in the title, but I assure you that there were NO bananas whatsoever in my dinner!) This restaurant classified itself as "modern asian cuisine," and Kelly and I both loved our meals!! We both had stir-fry (Kelly's was sweet and sour, mine was in a ginger sauce) and they were both delicious! We were very happy with our decisions!

After dinner, we strolled around town a bit more. We walked through the "Night Markets," which are very touristy, but a lot of fun. They sell lots of different stuff, but mostly souvenir-type things. We went all out with the free samples by trying lycee and passionfruit wine and also getting hand scrubs! We just poked around the different shops in the market before getting gelato and heading back to the hostel for some much needed sleep!

Australia Day 3: Leaving Sydney

2008-03-30T15:42:00.000-07:00

This morning we "slept in" until 9:25, at which time we got up to pack and check out. We left our suitcases at reception so that we didn't have to lug them around with us all day. We got brunch at Joe's Cafe, where we had nice omelettes, toast and flat whites. It was a very enjoyable meal, just sitting, relaxing, reading magazines, and chatting. Afterwards, we made some phone calls before heading out. We strolled through a really cute area called Paddington. There were lots of cute shops and boutiques, but since it was Good Friday, none of them were open. So we literally just window-shopped. We eventually made our way back to Darling Harbour, where the "Hoopla Festival" was going on. We stopped to watch an acrobatic show there -- it was pretty cool watching these girls do acrobatics on a rope. We were both feeling pretty lethargic and decided to take it easy and just walk around the Harbourside Mall. Then, we walked around to the other side of the harbor, which we had yet to see. Our plan was to catch the 3:16 bus back towards the hostel, and we wanted to grab a snack beforehand. Now, keep in mind that over the past 2 days, we have walked by a bustling cafe approximately every 5 to 10 minutes. But of course, since we were actually looking for one right now, for the life of us, we couldn't find a single one. (Granted, we did find some places that were closed for the holiday, but that didn't help us at all.) We finally found one where we grabbed coffee and muffins to bring with us to the bus stop.
Ok...one guess what bus we wanted to take? That's right...the 311. We arrived about 15 before the bus was scheduled to come, so we sat down to leisurely eat our muffins. After about 5 minutes, we look up and see the 311 pulling up.....BUT....it did not stop! Apparently, the buses only stop if someone ON the bus presses the button to get off, or if someone at the stop waves the bus down. SO, surprise, surprise...we missed the 311. Another one came after about 25 more minutes and we weren't in a big rush, so it was no big deal. It was just kind of funny to us because of our rocky history with bus #311.

(These are pictures from Hyde Park, which was walked through to catch the bus.)

When we got back to the lovely Pink House, we got our bags and used the bathrooms. We wanted to take some pictures of the house to document our experience. This one girl saw us taking pictures in the bathroom (which I admit IS a little weird!) but she gave us the strangest look. Then when she saw us taking more photos downstairs, she went and told the owner about us! So then the owner comes up to us and asks us it we are staying at this hostel. We told her yes, and then she just said "Oh, that's interesting." It was a pretty funny situation.

The inside of the shower (notice the grime on the walls and floor):

The door to the girls' bathroom:

Kelly standing outside the building on our way out:

We waited outside for the airport shuttle to pick us up. We wound up having the shuttle all to ourselves! We were so ahead of schedule that we arrived at the airport 3 hours ahead of flight, even though it was only domestic. It was fine though, because we certainly would rather hang out at the airport than at the Pink House! So we just took our time, looking in the shops and getting dinner. We got kebabs, which are a staple quick-food here (both in NZ and Australia). You have a choice of meat (usually beef, chicken or lamb), and then it comes with lettuce, cheese, tomato, onion, hummus and a choice of sauces. All of this is wrapped up in a pita and if you are lucky, toasted (and by lucky I mean at the right kebab place). They are quite delicious and are available practically every 5 storefronts in Auckland. So now that you know about kebabs in general, let me tell you about this particular kebab experience: since it was Good Friday, Kel and I ordered our kebabs without meat, which I assure you is HIGHLY unusual. The man at the kebab place was very confused, but made us our kebabs anyway. They were very good and we were still hungry (our bus stop muffins having been our last "meal") so we went back for seconds. Now, the kebab man thought we were pretty funny. He even remembered what toppings we each had on ours and he charged us a dollar less this time!
When we got to the gate, our flight was delayed slightly. When we boarded, we walked on to the tarmac and entered from the rear of the plane. During the customary demonstration of what to do in an emergency, Kelly and I got yelled at by the flight attendant for talking...it's not like we were being obnoxiously loud or anything! The flight was fine and once we landed, everything went really smoothly. We got our bags, took a shuttle to the hostel and let ourselves into our room with a key that was left for us in the mailbox (it was after reception hours). We were actually IN our room in less than an hour from the time we landed.

This hostel, Cairns City Backpackers, is a much better situation than the Pink House. It's still a hostel, of course, but a SIGNIFICANT improvement from our previous accommodation!

Maori Culture Weekend

2008-03-30T03:02:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was our second Loyola-sponsored trip. We stayed at a marae, which is a sacred meeting house within the Maori culture. (For anyone who is not aware, New Zealand is a bicultural nation having both Maori people - the indigenous tribal people of New Zealand - and "pakhia" - the people of European descent who settled here.) Instead of a traditional trip focused on sightseeing, this weekend had more of a focus on soaking up the culture of the Maori through various different activities.

When we arrived at the marae, we were instructed to remove our shoes as the marae is sacred. We participated in a traditional welcome ceremony called a powhiri, before we were allowed to actually enter the building. The first night we pretty much just had dinner, watched a movie, and went to sleep. The movie was Whalerider, which is about a Maori girl. I had actually seen the movie a couple of years ago, but it was really interesting to see it again and pick up on and appreciate the Maori culture in it. We all slept on mattresses on the floor in one big room.When we woke up in the morning, pretty much everyone had gotten eaten alive by bugs. After breakfast, we headed to a beach where we had free time just to hang out. It was overcast, and I didn't really feel like going in the water, so I played volleyball instead! After the beach, we went back to the marae for lunch. In the afternoon, we were split up into two different groups to participate in two workshops. My group did the weaving workshop first. We each cut a leaf off of a flax bush, and then walked down to the beach where we learned how to weave the leaf into the shape of a flower. This is my flower:The second workshop was learning Maori martial arts, which involves fighting with a long stick (think tribal jousting). Our martial arts instructor first had us do "conditioning" where we had to run sprints forwards and backwards for a good 20 minutes to a half hour. After everyone was all sweaty and tired out, we began the lesson. First, we learned the various different ways to block an attack and then we learned how to strike our opponent. The grand finale was when he paired us up and had us battle each other! A couple of the boys got really into it and at the end, the instructor faught both of them at once.

Afterwards, we went to the wharf in town and tried our hands at fishing. Overall, we were pretty unsuccessful, but 2 of the boys did catch a small fish each. I also spotted a stingray underneath the dock! After fishing, we went back to the marae where we showered up and had dinner. Once the dishes were done, we went to the "Leigh Sawmill Cafe" to hang out for a little while. A bunch of us were pretty tired out from the day and headed back to the marae early, which the rest of the group stayed for a couple drinks. We kept the doors and windows closed that night, to try to keep the bugs out, but I still got some new bites.

The next morning at breakfast, we were told to split up into our groups. (We had each been assigned to one of 3 groups for dishes duty for the weekend.) There were 3 activities planned for the day and the groups rotated the order. My group did kayaking first. We pretty much stayed within the bay, but it was a lot of fun! We played several games, like tag, which made it interesting. A couple of people tipped over but I think everyone had a really good time!

I don't have any pictures of the actual kayaking, but this is where we got into our kayaks:

Our next activity was snorkeling. We went to Goat Island Marine Reserve, which is supposed to have a pretty good selection of wildlife. Since I had just snorkeled in Australia, I knew how to do it here. The water was pretty murky, but it was still cool to see the fish. It was definitely a very different experience than at the Great Barrier Reef though! Our group ate our packed lunches on the beach before heading back to where the other two groups were.

The final activity was raft-building. We were divided up into groups of 6 and each group was given 2 barrels, 5 sticks of bamboo and some rope. The idea was to build a raft that could hold 3 people and then we would race the rafts. Our group had some trouble building something that would actually float. We were running out of time and had to just make our final attempt work. The first 3 people to take the raft out on the race did alright at the beginning, but by the time they got back, the raft had partially fallen apart. So when it was time for the second leg of the race, we only had half a raft to work with. I sat in the middle and used a kayak paddle to try to move us along, and then Josh and James half sat on the raft, half swam. Our team made it to the finish line first, but there was some controversy as to whether or not we should be disqualified since our raft didn't hold up! We had a fun time though.

Our raft is the one in the back:

Here's our rafting group after the race:

After a long morning and afternoon, we all headed back to the marae to pack up and receive our formal farewell. This was an interesting weekend and I really enjoyed it. We did some fun things, with a Maori twist, and also got to bond as a group. I'm definitely pretty tired out from the weekend though!

Australia Day 2: More of Sydney

2008-03-27T00:06:00.000-07:00

Australia Day 2 began with a search for the internet. We tried to use the internet in our own hostel, but it was SO slow that it wasn't even worth it. (Plus, the woman using it before us shut the computer down before she got up and then rudely said to Kelly, "Good luck with the computer. It takes forever to boot up." So we went to another hostel to mooch off of their internet.

We then walked towards an area called Darling Harbour, walking through Hyde Park on our way. We also visited the Queen Victoria Building, which is a mulit-level upscale shopping mall.
To get to Darling Harbour, we walked across a bridge which gave very pretty views of the harbor. Darling Harbour reminded me a little bit of a larger version of Baltimore's Inner Harbor. We just strolled all around the area, where there were lots of shops, restaurants and some really unique fountains. After a very brief walk through "Paddy's Market," which basically just sold a bunch of junk and knockoffs, we headed to the Sydney Fish Market!

We had planned to walk through Glebe, which is supposed to be a very pretty, artsy neighborhood, so we took a roundabout way to the fish market. However, we were both getting very hungry and tired, which was compounded by the heat, so we cut our ramble short. The fish market was a REALLY cool experience. We each picked out a piece of fresh tuna from the huge selection of fresh seafood offered. Then, we brought our tuna over to another counter, where they prepared it for us by grilling it and serving it up with chips (fries) and a salad. We also bought wasabi soy sauce from another counter, which went perfectly with the tuna. It was an absolutely delicious lunch! After lunch, we figured out where to catch a bus out to Bondi Beach. Bondi Beach is supposedly one of the most famous beaches in the world, and certainly in Australia, so we decided we had to check it out, even though it is a bit outside of the city. It was a very pretty beach and we just layed down and relaxed a bit. I was very glad that we decided to head out that way. It was so nice to just rest our feet! We decided to walk around the town for a bit and so we walked up the main street, checking out some possible places to have dinner. We decided on a Noodle Bar, where we picked our veggies, sauce, noodles, and meat, and then they cooked it all up for us in a wok! It was fresh and very nice.
After dinner, we walked along the beach. The sun was beginning to set at this time, and we got some really great photos. Then we caught the bus back to Circular Quay. We had quite an interesting bus ride. There was this man who was listening to his headphones and was rapping along with them the entire ride. He was dancing and singing and so many of the passengers (ourselves included) were just cracking up watching this guy! Then, when we got to his stop, he turned around and said to everyone, "Keep dancing with passion everyone! Have a great Easter!"

When we got back into the city, we took some night shots of the bridge and the Opera House. We walked to "The Rocks" where we were planning on treating ourselves to dessert. Our waiter from last night recommended this place called "Pancakes on the Rocks" as a great spot to get dessert pancakes, so we had been excited about it all day! Kelly had pancakes with apples, raisins, cinnamon sugar and ice cream, and I had chocolate pancakes with oranges, Grand Marnier, chocolate sauce and ice cream. Both were delicious!! Afterwards, we walked back to the bus stop to try again for the 311, hoping we would have better luck than the previous night. We still had to wait a while, but it eventually came! We were so excited that we made fools of ourselves by taking goofy pictures of ourselves in front of the bus. I'm sure we were the happiest people on bus 311 that night! We ended the day as we began: with a search for internet. This time we wound up in yet ANOTHER hostel before heading back to the Pink House -- our favorite place in the world :)

Australia Day 1: Getting to Sydney

2008-03-26T05:50:00.001-07:00

We started out trip nice and early Wednesday morning. We were picked up by a shuttle at 3:30 AM outside of our apartment and we headed off to the airport. When we were checking in, the woman asked for our passports and then told us that we needed visas to travel to Australia (which we did not have)! For a split second, we didn't know what to do, but then she said that we could just go and get electronic visas at another counter. Whew! After getting our visas, we had to go to another counter to pay a $25 departure tax, which is required of everyone leaving New Zealand.

The flight to Sydney took about 3 hours and when we were coming in to land, we had a beautiful view of the city!

After going through customs and gathering our luggage, we found our way to a shuttle that would take us to our hostel. We stayed at "The Pink House," which was QUITE interesting, let me say! Very skeevy place, not clean and just a strange group of people staying there. Luckily, we were only there for 2 nights, so we decided to stick it out, especially since we paid for a 4-share dorm and received a twin room instead. Thank God Kelly and I had our own room, or we probably would have been so freaked out by the place that we would have left.

Anyway, after "settling in" as best as possible under the circumstances, we headed out to explore Sydney! We did SO much walking that day. We walked all along the water, through a park called the Domain, and then through the Royal Botanical Gardens. We were getting really hungry, so we ducked out of the gardens for a bit to grab some lunch (DELICIOUS chicken, avocado, tomato and cheese sandwiches). On our walk back towards the gardens, we stopped to check out the Art Gallery NSW (New South Wales), which had some very interesting exhibits - a lot of contemporary style art. When we finally got back to the gardens, we were walking through a shaded area because it was so warm out. We were hearing some weird, bird-sounding noises, and Kelly looked up in the trees to see what it was. It turned out that there were literally HUNDREDS of bats in the trees. Kelly got really freaked out and we tried to get out of that area as fast as possible. It was pretty funny!

We continued our walk along the water and wound up right at the Sydney Opera House! There was also a beautiful view of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in the background. We took TONS of pictures. It was just so amazing to actually SEE these places. I mean, the Sydney Opera House is one of those things that I've seen in pictures a million time, and now here I was, standing right in front of it. As we made our way to the harbor area, we tried to find an internet cafe, so we went inside of the Marriot to ask directions. What a change from the Pink House!! We then bought postcards and went to a cafe for some flat whites (delicious...basically a shot of espresso in steamed milk....pretty much the staple coffee in NZ and Australia). So we were sitting at these outdoor tables, just relaxing and resting our feet while writing out some postcards. But we noticed that around us, they were putting all of the other tables and chairs away, so that it was just us. They said that they were closing, so we felt rushed and just packed our stuff up and left. As we were walking away, the waitress comes running up to us....we had totally forgotten to pay! It was very embarrassing, but I think they could tell from our reaction that it was a complete mistake. We stopped into another art museum on our way to the old part of town, which is called "The Rocks." We just strolled around the area, stopping into shops, etc. We went to an Italian restaurant for dinner. We had pasta, but the portions were really small and we were still hungry. After dinner, we walked back to the harbor to wait for the bus to bring us back near out hostel. We waited at the bus stop for an hour and a half for bus #311 to come. Tons of other buses were coming by, but not the one we needed of course. We confirmed with 3 different bus drivers that we were in the right place (which we were) but they just said that there was a traffic accident and that they were running behind schedule. Finally, it was getting too late, so we just took a cab back to our neighborhood.

We went into a hostel that was not ours, just to use their internet! Since we were still hungry, we decided to have a second dinner. (After all that waiting at the bus stop, we deserved it!) While we were looking for a place to eat, we had the strangest experience: We were standing outside of a restaurant, reading the menu, which happened to be right next to the table where an older couple was sitting. The woman looked up at us and told us that the lamb was fabulous. She then asked us if we wanted to try it and before we even had a chance to respond, she was shoving her fork in my face, and then Kelly's. Not only did we eat lamb off some random woman's fork, but she fed it too us! THEN...she and her husband proceeded to talk to us for another 20 minutes and insisted that we sit down at their table with them. They were very nice and friendly, it was just kind of an unusual situation! After they left, we had our own dinner...we shared fajitas and they were very yummy!! Back at the hostel, we showered in the disgusting bathroom and then went to sleep, exhausted after an amazing day!

I'm Back!

2008-03-26T05:43:00.001-07:00

For Easter break, Kelly and I decided to take a trip to Australia. It was something that was on the top of both of our lists of places to travel to this semester.

So that's why I've haven't posted in a while...I've haven't been around to do it! Since this was such a big trip, I have way too much to say to keep it all in one post. I was able to type up posts each day from an internet cafe, so now I just need to add the pictures to it. I'll gradually be putting up these entries and I'll probably separate them by each day.

I'm warning you that the Australia posts are a lot more detailed and tedious than some of my previous ones....so bear with me. (And if they turn out to be too much for you, don't write me off completely...just skip the Australia ones and check back over the next couple of weeks for my future posts.)

BUT...if I might say so myself, Australia was AMAZING! I did and saw some pretty cool things that just might be worth reading about :)

So to recap: I'm going to have a post for each day of my Australia trip. I'll try to give you a hint in the title as to the main thing we did that day.

Enjoy,
Lauren

Beaches, Caves and Forests

2008-03-16T15:12:00.000-07:00

We rented cars again for another weekend trip. We drove to the town of Raglan, which is a popular surfing town because of the great surf conditions. None of us are expert surfers, but we spent the day at the beach anyway, just swimming and trying to bodysurf. We had nice weather for the most part, so we were just enjoying being out in the sun. After everyone had had enough of the water, we played a game of rugby on the sand. (We were trying to embrace the Kiwi culture by playing the national sport!)

After the beach, we went back to our hostel. We cooked a big family dinner of chicken, sausages, pasta and salad. There were 15 of us on this trip, and it was fun (and economical!) to all cook dinner together.

(That's Kelly, Smitty and Kim getting dessert ready. We had apples with Nutella and then TimTams. TimTams are a delicious chocolate cookie that have been a bit hit with our group!)

Our hostel was in a very wooded area, and there was a "flying fox" (zip-line kind of thing) and a ropes course in the woods. After dinner, we went to play on them for a while. (The flying fox was REALLY not as frightening as you would imagine from the look on my face!)

Later that night, we walked up to "Inspiration Point," which looked out over the water. It was such a beautiful, clear night. As has become tradition, we just all hung out listening to Nick, TK, and Timm (our musicians playing the guitar, sax and bongos, respectively). Just laying down, looking up at the stars and listening to the music really got all of us thinking about what an incredible experience this is for us. I just thought to myself, "What am I doing here? I am in NEW ZEALAND, surrounded by amazing scenery and friends, up on something called "Inspiration Point," gazing up at the stars." Something about that night really hit all of us and reminded us of how lucky we are to be experiencing all of this.

(This picture doesn't do the evening justice, but at least it's a glimspe of what it was like.)

The next morning, 6 of us girls got up really early so we could head out to Waitomo Caves. (Side note: I was the driver for the girls' car from this point on. I actually found driving on the left side pretty intuitive, and really enjoyed it. Don't worry Dad, I was very careful!) We dropped off Kim, Dana and Gina, who were going to visit the glowworm caves, and then Kelly, Cate and I headed on to "Haggas Honking Holes."

I'm going to do my best to describe this caving experience, but first of all, let me say that this was BY FAR the best thing I have done in NZ yet (and maybe one of the coolest things I have ever done)! We got all suited up in our wetsuit, helmets, and boots and then headed outside for a lesson in abseiling (rappelling). We learned how to attach the ropes and how to rappel down the wall. Then, we ventured down into the caves. The very first thing we did was a 20 meter abseil down. We walked a bit until we got to our next abseil - but this one was down a waterfall! The water was really cold and was pouring on you the whole way down. Then, when I got to the bottom and unhooked by ropes, I looked around. I was standing in about a foot of water, in a little cavern, and had no idea where we would go from here, since there seemed to be no exit. Then, I was told to get on my hands and knees and crawl through the opening "over there." When I looked where the guy was pointing, I literally said "You're kidding! That hole??" But I did it! And when I got through the other side, our guide was waiting to hook us on to another rope to descend deeper into the cave. There was one point where we were hooked onto a rope, told to shut off our lights and were just dropped downward in the darkness, where we landed in a pool of water. In total, we went down 85 meters underground. It was just a completely unique experience, to be climbing around inside of a cave, going down underground waterfalls, squeezing through small places, crawling on my hands and knees, and then making our way back out. I wish I had pictures of this experience, but we weren't allowed to bring our cameras, which would have gotten ruined anyway.

We were so smelly and gross afterwards, but we were able to take hot showers before heading back to the car. We met up with the other group of girls, had lunch at a cafe and then drove to Hamilton. Caitlin, one of the girls on our trip, has a brother who is also studying in New Zealand. He lives in a house in Hamilton, and kindly allowed all 15 of us to spend the night at his house. (There were two rooms with several couches, so we spread out between them and the floor and it wasn't bad at all!) We drove into Hamilton for dinner and then went back to the house to hang out for a bit and get ready. We went back into town later to go to an Irish pub for "St. Practice Day." Here's Kelly and I at the house in Hamilton, and then a candid group shot of everyone hanging around.

The next morning, a different group was up early to go caving (They did the "Lost World," which was 7 hours long, whereas our "Haggas Honking Holes" was 4 hours). The rest of us slept in a bit longer, and then drove out to head back towards Auckland. We stopped at Countdown, a supermarket, so everyone could get some breakfast. We all sat outside in the parking lot eating it!

Then on our drive back, we stopped at a scenic nature reserve. Some people stayed in the car and read, other hiked part of the way and stopped to rest and read at a lookout. Four of us, Cate, Nick, TK and myself, hiked all the way up. We climbed a total of 1500 steps, but it was worth it because we made it to a beautiful lookout point. We were hiking through a Kauri forest (Kauris are enormous trees that can live to be several thousand years old). It was warm out, but I enjoyed the hike a lot. We only hiked for about an hour and a half and then headed back to the car and drove back to Auckland. This was definitely an exciting weekend and another successful road trip!

The view from the upper lookout point:

A panoramic shot (try clicking on it to make it bigger):

TK and Nick looking up at a Kauri tree...you can get a feel for just how big they really are!

Cate, Nick and I with an amazing view behind us. The climb was definitely worth this!

Courses and Horses!

2008-03-08T15:31:00.000-08:00

So this week was our first week of classes. I made it through week 1! Actually, from the feeling I got about things, my classes won't be TOO bad. The University of Auckland is VERY different from Loyola College, but I think that I will get used to the way they do things here.

The most obvious difference is class size. At Loyola, our classes are never more than 25-30 people, and here my 4 classes have about 45, 90, 200 and 250 students in them. The size makes the coursework different too: I only have a couple of assignments for each course, so it's really up to me to keep up with the reading in between these few graded things. Not only are the classes much larger, but the university is about 10 times the size. Just walking around campus, I am baffled by how many people there are! There are just people everywhere - on the quad, in the computer labs, on the streets around campus, waiting for classes.

I am taking one math class, and 3 core classes (English, History and Theology). So far, I am really enjoying my math course, and it is definitely my favorite of the 3. I reserve the right to retract that statement down the line though, because this course is "team taught," meaning that the professor teaching it now is not our only professor for the course. Throughout the semester, there will be 3 different professors giving the lectures. (So even though I like this guy, I might not be so fond of the next 2.)

My English professor is just plain kooky. She seems nice enough, but her lecture was so all over the place that it couldn't really even be called a lecture. I wish you could read the notes I took in that class because they don't make sense even to me. She was very entertaining though, and since it's a 2 hour class, I'm hoping that at least her eccentricity will keep me from being bored!

For my history course, believe it or not I am taking US History. My reasoning behind this decision was that I was curious to see how the material would be presented in another country and what sort of a spin they would put on things. Since this is material that I have been exposed to repeatedly since grade school (obviously on various different levels), it is very interesting to see what a professor here chooses to focus on in a course that only lasts one semester. For many students in the class, this may be the first time that they are formally taught US History, and I am interested to see things from that kind of perspective. I actually felt slightly uncomfortable as an American in this course and I have a feeling that taking this abroad will strengthen my feelings of patriotism.

Finally, my theology course is called "Race and Culture in Practical Theology." It seems like the focus will be much more on the role of culture in New Zealand society than on any specific theology. A bunch of us Loyola students are in this course, but besides us, most of the people taking this course are older (in their 30's and 40's) and are studying to be ministers. There are also several different cultures represented among the students in this course, so that should prove interesting since the course focuses so heavily on this topic. While this is a 3 hour long class, an hour of it involves small group discussion, so I really don't think it will be too bad.

Anyway, enough about my classes! Just know that even though this might not be the impression you get from reading this, I DO take classes over here! I'll try to take some pictures of the actual campus sometime this week, but for now, some general Auckland pictures will have to do!

(An overall view, Albert Park, and the Skytower)

So yesterday, I had a fun day out at the horse races! It was the Auckland Cup, and the University sponsored a trip for the students to attend. It really was a great day out. We had beautiful weather. This is us walking through the parking lot at the racetrack.

We got all dressed up to go. Earlier this week, we tried to find hats to wear, but we didn't have any luck. Here's Kelly and I with Dana and Kim in our dresses before we left:

We had tables set up on the lawn, there was food and music, and we watched the races. I bet on 3 races, and only won once - a whopping $3.60. (But I only bet a total of $12 the whole day, so it's not like I was down a lot or betting my life savings!) It was just fun to pick your horses and cheer them on when they came around the tracks.

Kim was really lucky though! She won $41 yesterday. Here are Kelly and Kim, with Kim holding her winning tickets:
At one point, the starting gate was set up right near where we were sitting.

Overall, this was a very enjoyable day. I liked just being outside in the nice weather and being dressed up. I have to say that I felt very sophisticated!

Coromandel Peninsula

2008-03-01T21:44:00.000-08:00

I just got back this afternoon from our trip to Coromandel Peninsula. We stayed in the town of Whitianga, which was about a 2 and 1/2 hour drive from our apartment in Auckland. Again, we didn't have the best weather for our trip, but we still had a great time!

We left early on Friday morning in 4 rental cars. The people brave enough to try driving on the other side of the road did a wonderful job and got all of us there safely. I am proud to say, however, that my car (don't worry, I was NOT the driver) was the only car not to get lost on the way there! Once we arrived at our hostel, we had to wait a bit to check in, so we just explored the town. We were staying right near a beach, so we walked around a bit and ate our packed lunches. There were 22 of us total on this trip, split up between 2 dormitory style rooms (8 beds in one room and 14 in another).

(This was taken right at the end of our street!)

Once we got settled in, we headed out for the beach! We knew the weather forecast was not good for Saturday or Sunday, so we wanted to make the best of Friday's sunny weather. We drove to a car park and waited for the other cars to catch up. One group went on ahead while some of us waited. But then finally, the last car was so lost and was so far behind that we had to go on withouth them...they eventually caught up with us later. The beach at Cathedral Cove was a 45 minute walk from the car park. It was a nice walk, and actually tougher than I was anticipating!

It was WELL worth it though, because we stopped along at beautiful little inlets and were walking through absolutely beautiful scenery.

Cathedral Cove is so named because there is a cave-like rock formation that connects two beaches. You can look from one beach to the other through this "cave" and inside it has a very high cathedral style ceiling. The water was beautiful and very comfortable for swimming. There was a rock a little ways out, which we all swam to and then jumped off of! It was so amazing to be swimming in such beautiful surroundings.

Here's Cathedral Cove:

And this is the rock we were jumping off of:

We walked back to the cars and everyone was tired out and ready to shower. We actually got ready surprisingly fast for such a large group. We walked into town and everyone just kind of split up and found places to eat for dinner. After dinner, we all headed to the beach to hang out. The sky was clear and you could see so many stars. Nick brought his guitar and Tom had his saxophone, so we had a little sing-a-long on the beach. Very fun!

The next morning, we woke up to the sound of pouring rain. And I mean like torrential downpour! The rain lightened up for a bit and we walked into town for brunch at a little cafe. Then we just kind of hung around at the hostel that afternoon playing cards and watching movies. We all chipped in for groceries and cooked dinner that night. We had burgers on the grill, pasta, and salad.

After dinner, we headed out to Hot Water Beach. There are thermal springs beneath this beach, so for 2 hours on either side of low tide, you can dig in the sand and hot water comes up! It's pretty amazing. The boys dug out a huge hole and built up a wall to keep the ocean water out. So basically, we made our own hot tub right on the beach. There was one part in the center though where the water was actually bubbling because it was so hot. It was a weird experience because the water near the center was so hot it was actually burning you, but then the upper part of your body, which was exposed to the air and the drizzle, was freezing! We were all splashing the hot water around trying to keep everyone warm. When it started to rain harder, we decided it was time to leave.

(Unfortunately, since it was raining, I don't have any pictures from Hot Water Beach...I didn't want my camera to get wet.)

Again, we all went back to shower off. I have been enjoying my showers in New Zealand much more than at home because they are always so needed! Once everyone was ready, we headed into town. There was a live band playing at the local pub, so we went to check that out. It turned out to be a pretty good time.

This morning, we had to be checked out by 10, so we all got up and got our stuff together and cleaned up. Of the 4 cars, 3 of them decided we would just head home. The fourth car wanted to drive somewhere to go on a hike. I was pretty tired out and also needed to take a trip to the grocery store, so I decided to head back to Auckland. We decided to take advantage of still having the rental cars and actually DRIVE to the grocery store....instead of walking and carrying our groceries back the whole way!

So, classes start tomorrow and that should put a different twist on things here. Vacation mode is coming to an end...now I'll actually have a schedule to stick to. The structure will be nice, but I'm really hoping that I will still have enough free time to relax and enjoy being here.

Devonport

2008-02-26T21:22:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was a beautiful day, and we didn't have anything to do for orientation until 5 PM, so a bunch of us decided to make it a beach day! We got up early and took a ferry to Devonport, a peninsula about 15 minutes away from central Auckland.

Here's the view from the ferry:
We all wore our bathing suits and packed lunches. We walked along the water and then out towards North Head, which is the remains of a volcanic cone.

We climbed up the cone, which was pretty steep at spots.

We had some amazing views over Auckland and I took a ton of pictures.

We climbed for a while, just exploring around the area.

Apparently, there were fortifications and bunkers built here during WWII for fear of a Russian invasion (one which never occurred). So the remains of all these bunkers and tunnels are still there and open for the public to walk around.

We were all getting pretty hungry, so we just plopped ourselves on the grass and ate our picnic lunches. A couple of the boys had scoped out the swimming spots, so we walked down to a secluded beach. The water was pretty cold, so I just waded and didn't actually swim. It was still fun to be at the beach though!!

The weather here is very fickle and can go from bright blue skies to rain in a matter or minutes. And it did just that while we were there. While the sun was shining right above us, we could actually see the rain in the distance heading towards us. So....what did we do? We grabbed our stuff and headed for a bunker to wait for the rain to pass. It didn't take long, and soon the sun was back out and so were we.

Once we were done with the beach, we headed back to the ferry. We just missed it, so we got ice cream while we were waiting! Then we headed back to the apartments to shower and get ready for International Students Quiz Night on campus. There was free pizza and several rounds of quiz questions, so a bunch of us went to that. No one from Loyola won anything, but oh well. We found out at the quiz night that people were trying to organize a pub crawl for the international students, so we all decided to go to that. We only went to two places, but it was a fun night.

Today I went to the bookstore to look at what books I need for class....a reminder that I'm not just here on vacation, even though that's what it seems like so far! Classes start on Monday, but we are going on a trip this weekend to Coromandel Peninsula! We're leaving early on Friday morning and coming home Sunday night so my next post will probably be about that. I hope everyone is doing well!

Love,

Lauren

Finally Dry!

2008-02-23T14:31:00.000-08:00

We got back yesterday afternoon from our first Loyola-sponsored trip. We went to the Bay of Islands, which is north of Auckland. It was a really fun trip, but it rained almost the entire time. I honestly don't think that I have ever been so wet so continously as I was this weekend. But now I've showered and am finally warm and dry!

On the way up, we drove through beautiful scenery. It is very green and hilly here. In the town where we stayed, Paihia, we went on a boat ride called "Mack Attack." We had to get all suited up in raincoats and rainpants because it was a pretty rough ride. We all got completely soaked, but it was so much fun. Here are Kelly and I in our lovely suits!

Luckily, the sun came out for a bit while we were out on the water. The boat went all the way out to a place called Hole in the Rock and then we headed back to shore.

The next day, was supposed to be our beach day, but it was pouring rain. We were on a bus called "Dune Rider" that can drive on the beach. We drove about 300 miles that day, all the way up to the northernmost tip of New Zealand to a point called Cape Reinga. It was overcast, but you can still see how beautiful it is! Since it was raining, the paths were muddy and on top of that the wind was unbelievable. It actually really fun that we were there in such extreme weather conditions.

We were supposed to stop to go to the beach, but our driver said that the conditions were too dangerous for him to drive there, so we went swimming in a river instead. We were already soaked, so it didn't matter that it was raining while we were swimming. We finally did get to drive along the beach for a little while, and we saw a seal out on the sand!

Our bus broke down on our drive back, so we had to wait for another bus to come and get us. Overall, this whole trip was quite an adventure!

Settling In

2008-02-19T18:22:00.000-08:00

I'm on my way to a meeting right now, but I just wanted to say that I got here safely and I'm settling in very nicely so far! The trip was long, but didn't seem nearly as bad as I thought it would.

It's been a little hectic so far, but overall everything is going REALLY well. I'm meeting lots of new people and already starting to get to know my way around the city. Our coordinator took us on quick walking tour around Auckland yesterday, pointing out the places we really needed to know about. Then, we went to "The Warehouse," which is comparable to a K-Mart, to pick up supplies for our room.

Today, I just got a cell phone. I feel much more connected now that I know I can contact the other people in our group. A bunch of us got phones, so that should work out well.

I know that this is a total stream of consciousness right now, but I don't have time to organize my thoughts so I'm just filling you in on random bits of info that come to mind. Like this: Last night for dinner, I had a kebab! It was from a little place with just a walk-in counter. I got chicken, and it was all wrapped up in a pita. Apparently, they are very big here. It was very good!

Alright, I have to go, but when I get a chance I'll post again!

Here it is!

2008-02-11T18:25:00.001-08:00

I've been talking about this for a while, but I've finally set up this blog. It was actually a lot easier than I thought it would be. I'm planning to keep this updated pretty regularly throughout the semester with thoughts and pictures from my semester abroad.

So, as you probably already know if you are reading this, I am spending this semester studying abroad at the University of Auckland in Auckland, New Zealand. With just shy of 40,000 students, this is the largest university in New Zealand. Taking classes here should be quite an interesting change from the small classes I am used to at Loyola. The 35 of us going from Loyola will all be living in the same apartment building along with other international students, and we will be taking classes with all of the New Zealanders.

I'm leaving on Sunday, February 17th, so I still have several days left to finish packing and getting everything together. All in all, I'm in pretty good shape though. I'm really excited for this whole experience, but I think that what I'm MOST excited about is waking up early Sunday morning to get to JFK airport by 5:30 AM! That ought to be fun.

Well, I really just wanted to get this started and say hello. I'm really hoping that you'll keep up with me over the next four and a half months while I'm hopefully having the time of my life! I'm going to try my best to keep in touch, so please feel free to post comments directly on this site, email me at lskrantz@loyola.edu, Facebook me, call me on Skype, or IM me.

More soon,
Lauren