3hrs 45 to go
Until its 2007 for me here in New Zealand...how sweet is that, I'm 18hrs ahead of EST. Currently hanging out w/ my cousin Craig and some of his friends...
Just wanted to wish you all a Happy New Year!! 2007 is going to be sweet!!
Hope you all had a great xmas, have a fun, safe new years celebration!
P.s Ny- sorry, happy hannukah!! :) and I need your email!! Email me or leave it on here! Thanks buddy!!
P.p.s I am writing my south island blog, its really long and taking forever!!
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Merry Christmas!!
Hi guys, sorry this is a bit late but I hope y'all had a great christmas!!
Dave and I spent the morning w/ my aunt, uncle, cousin, other cousin's wife and son, and grandparents. Then in the afternoon we went to my other cousins wifes dads house hahah got that?? :) Good times.
Today- boxing day, we slept late and then went on a tour around Christchurch to show Dave around. Then I took Finn for a walk while Dave tried to find accomodation in Sydney- she's leaving tomorrow, and that marks the end of our trip!! How crazy is that?!
Don't panic, I've started to write about our south island trip and I will finish it up and post it soon!!
Stay tuned!
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Hooray!!
Heeeellloooooo friends!! My new blackberry is up and running and ithe internet is back at my fingertips once again after a very long 3(ish) weeks!!
I'm not going to sit here and type everything that has happened but I'll summarize it :)
Since I last wrote we...
Went to Tongarira National Park which has a 8 hour walk which is ridiculously crazy and a couple of people died up there this year b/c the weather changes quicker than you can blink. When we were there the weather was not good so they closed the crossing. Sooo instead the group did some different walks- at the base of the mountains, not on top of them. I booked to go horse riding pretty last minute but it worked out and it was grea. That area is absolutley beautiful. My horse's name was Shady haha, he was kind of Shady, but we had fun- even though my reins broke! Thelady who owned the horses offered to drive me back to the hotel a bit later, so I got to hanmg around with the horses for a while which was great. Back at the hotel I hung out by the fire and waited for everyone else to get back. Then I helped Ali (our driver) make Apple Crumble and Custard- 2 huge pans of it!! Ate dinner, ate amazing apple crumble, hung out for a while and went to bed. The next day we drove to Wellington- the capital. We got there pretty late in the day so there wasn't much time to do anything...we went to Te Papa which is the national museum...I only made it around the Maori part b/c I wanted to wander around the city before everything closed... Tha evening we went to dinner with Ali and some of the group from the bus, hung out for a while and then watched The Ringer which wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.
The next day we drove the looongggg drive up to Auckland, and had to change buses 3 times along the way which was pretty ridiculous but we finally made it to Auckland. Bought some groceries and pretty much just went to bed. The next day we got on another bus, well more like a van, with our driver Rob- a crazy dude!! He talked the whoooleee time, he was hilarious. We stopped several times along the way to the Bay of Islands... We stopped at a famous toilet that I can't remember the name of, then we stopped to visit a bird sanctuary and touch kiwi birds, but it was closed... Oh, haha, Rob turned me into his PA and had me phoning to book the hostels, and texting other drivers etc, it was funny, I'd rather do it for him than have him try to do it while driving us... We finally made it to Paihia, checked into our hostel and just hung out, I met some Aussies and walked around with them for a while. The next day we checked out but left our luggage at the hostel then laid on the beach all day and did nothing, oh wait, we bought new puzzle books haha and did those. Rob picked us back up early evening, this time he had another driver w/ him- Scoobs, he was hilarious and the 2 of them together were out of control, it was a very amusing drive back to Auckland. We made it back around 9pm, changed and went to the hoistel bar down the road, had a couple of beers, met some people but went home pretty early. Although we had some room mates who couldn't be quiet when they came home at 3.30am- haha but this was funny, 1 was a loud mouth stereotypical American girl, and she apparently got punched in the face by a local guy for being American, I asked if she called the cops and she said they showed up and told her to shut up b/c she was being annoying- not surprising. So that was kind of amusing, I mean, not good, but if you met her you'd be amused.
Friday we checked out and took the shuttle to the airport. Hopped on a plane, and flew to Christchurch! My aunt Lynny picked us up, with my little 2nd cousin, 3 year old William who is visiting from England! We went back to Lynny's and hung out, talked about the trip, caught up etc. My Grandad and step-gran came over for dinner, we caught up and hung out. Oh!! I forgot to mention Finn (a chocolate labrador) and Murph (a koool cat!) So now I have pets again!! Yay!! We did some laundry (hooray clean clothes), hung out, re-packed and went to bed.
Sat. Morning we ate leftover pavlova for breakfast (yummy!) And Lynny dropped us in town. We hopped on another Stray bus, w/ another driver, Spanky! We drove about 3 hours to Kaikora. We didn't book any activities so we walked to find a seal colony- unsuccesfully, sat on the pebble beach for a while and read, I spent a while on the phone to Blackberry b/c this new one wasn't working, we wandered around the shops, cooked some dinner (very domestic!), met an Irish guy, talked to him for a while, then watched about 1/2 of 7 Years in Tibet and now we're just chilling, watching England get killed by Australia in crickett...sweet.
Woah, I'm caught up!! Amazing!! Maybe one day I'll get ambitious and to y'all about Australia...maybe not.
Ok, leave some love, this took a lot to get figured out!
Hope all is well at home, good luck with finals, and don't get frostbite muhahahaha!!
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update
so its been a while since i've put anyting of any interest on here...and i'm probably not going to add tons right now but i thought i'd give an update...
First off, my blackberry is still dead.
Next- We're in New Zealand (yes i skipped most of OZ on here, sorry), we started in Auckland, got on a Stray bus (
www.straytravel.com i think) and have since been to Hahei- where I went sea kayaking in a marine reserve with massive waves!! we went to cathedral cove beach which was really pretty; from there we went to Raglan, then Rotorua which smells like rotten eggs= sulphur, today we went to a Maori village which was super cool, and now we're in Taupo which is home to the largest lake in NZ, it could fit Singapore in it!! tomorrow we're going to a national park, which i cant remember the name of :) then down to Wellington and back up to Auckland. From Auckland we're getting on a different bus and going to the Bay of Islands and spending a night in Paihia, then back to Auckland. Then we'll fly to Christchurch, spend a night with my aunt and uncle and then pick upo another stray bus and do the south island before xmas! craziness!! but the cool thing is that these bus passes are valid for multiple use over the next year which means i can go back and do it all over, or only parts of it etc! cool huh?
ok Australia....the outback was super cool, really different from the coast...we saw hundreds of kangaroos, we went through Carnavaron national park/gorge, porcupine gorge, we saw aboriginal art on cave walls, we went swimming in water holes, ummm went to "towns" that only had one building but were on the map! ummm Cairns was fun the 2nd time around, we had a couple of good nights out, tons of fun!
so its christmas soon, and its nice to be in a country that actually refers to it as christmas, and people say merry christmas, instead of happy holidays- sorry to those of you who don't celebrate xmas and would rather it be happy holidays etc, but i just like this better and i'm not even christian or any kind of religious. but on a different, similar note, it doesnt even feel like xmas, and i certainly havent done any xmas shopping, nor am i ready to even think about it being xmas. although it is colder here than it was in OZ so its easier to think of it being xmas time.
its supposed to be summer but the maori lady at the village today said the seasons are 6 weeks behind b/c of global warming...good to know, but that doesnt help much...
oh man, we keep staying in hostels that dont provide bedding, but charge alot, and then charge for bedding, and its soo frikkin cold at night... last night i was going to pay for bedding and the office closed at 8pm before i could get there! what the hell?!
tonight's place has bedding!
and theres a pub down the road which has a $20 (nz) thing= 3 beers (which cost $6 each) plus bangers and mash or fish and chips or spaghetti bolognaise!! how sweet is that!! so no microwave rice for me tonight!
oooook
well i think thats enough
leave some love, i'll try and update this a bit more, but paying for internet is not appealing!
