I told you I'm horrible at this...

So I was without internet my last week in NZ and didn't write about the last few days in the country. Here's the highlights:

11/9 - Sunday

woke up 7:30 in wellington at my flat

taxi came early

went to rental car via train kaiwharawhara

checked in at berkenhoff 

sky dived at 2 instead of 3.

met Sancos and Alex

ate Thai food couldn't find restaurant

Isaac came over

went to bed

11/10 - Monday

slept in, reception told us to leave. coco on floor

packed and left

touristy shit

huka falls

went to the dam

got honey

got lost going to craters

turned around

wound up in wellington

returned car and waited at station after getting gas.

stayed at nomads on wakefield st

danced on tables all night :)

11/11 - Tuesday

Left Welli and drove through flat hills and got lunch

Drove to Taupo

watched the others do the Taupo bungy

Stopped in Rotorua

Saw the thermal mud pools

visited the Huka Falls

set up in Marae

walk to river

dinner - chicken, kumera, garlic bread

talk to sean

slept in Main House of Marae

11/12 - Wednesday

thermal marae village

watched the haka and poi

Went white water rafting with Pete

-over a 7 meter fall!!!

walked to/around town 

hot tubbed it with coco and becca

jumped on the trampoline we found in the back yard

ate dinner at the shed - kumera fries and quesadillas

back at hotel afterwards

11/13 Thursday

Drove up through Auckland 

Got a Kebab for lunch!

Picked up new people

Drove to Pahia and set up in a hotel

Ate pasta for dinner

Hung out at the hotel for the night

11/14 Friday

Slept in and took a ferry over with coco to Russell

toured Russell and climbed flagstaff hill and saw the oldest church in NZ

Did gravestone rubbings

Ferried back to Pahia

Jet skiied in the bay =)

Walked to the place where the treaty of Waitangi was signed

(but didn't pay $20 to go in)

Ate dinner with the rest of the group, and it was delicious fish

Went out for the night and danced forever

I may have had a guy dancing with me, but when the night was over i leaned in and just said goodnight and walked away =) hahaha he ran away with his friend afterwards.

11/15

Left real early and drove back to Auckland

Met up with Jackie and left Becca after going to the hostel.

Coco, Jackie and I went to the market that is at the top of Queen street, 

Then I got my bags and headed to the bus stop to start my 20 hours home!

My flight left at 7:30pm and I was at the airport way too early as usual, but I had to pay an excess charge of $200 for one extra bag. It sucked!!!

I was finally on the flight back. The flight to San Francisco was long, about 12 hours but I slept a lot which was nice, and I had 4 hot guys next to me so that was helpful. I then jumped to a different flight and waited around for over an hour, but got sushi for dinner =)

The flight to Boston went well and I got to watch more movies. 6 hours later I was in Boston where Jamison and Kat picked me up!

Whew. It was such a long journey home, but I made it safe and sound and now I am home and back to work at the gap.

AHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhh

I JUST JUMPED OUT OF A PLANE 15,000 FEET UP!! Woo what a rush. I think I blacked out for most of the jump, but after about 30 seconds of sensory overload I caught up with myself and felt the breeze blowing =)

We drove to Taupo leaving real early to pick up a rental car. Then we drove 5ish hours and checked into the Burkenhoff lodge. They called Freefall to say that we had arrived and they moved us up to a 2pm jump! AHHH it was so scary at first but before I realized what had happened I was being told to hold myself up by a railing and to "come sit on my thighs," hahahaha. LOVED ANDREW. He was my tandem partner. It was great. I jumped second, Rebecca was first and Coco was third. As I said before I didn't really know what was going on for at least 20-30 seconds, but then suddenly it caught up with me and I felt the wind whizzing past me so fast! The first drop over the ledge I felt a bit sick, but then I got acclimated to falling and I wasn't nauseous as much. CRAZINESS.

After the jump we were talking with some of the guys who also jumped and we ended up going out for dinner in the park (aww) and had a blast. Then it was off to bed early, completely crashing. 

The next day we went to see the Huka Falls and see the dam open. It was pretty neat, but soon enough we were back on the road driving a few hours back into Wellington.

Our last night in Wellington was AMMAAZZINNG! We stayed at the hostel where we'd be picked up in the morning, Nomad's Capital. We went to the bar with a few guys who were staying in our room with us and saw a group dancing on tables and having a blast. So we joined in and soon enough we figured out that this crazy group was the tour group that we were joining the next day! It was such a fun night of dancing like crazy and were later told that we "destroyed the place," in a good way of course. We got looks from most of the girls and had the best time making them all jealous. I have no clue why they were jealous of us, but I think it had something to do with the American dancing that we knew how to do. See Kiwi, Aussie, and Brittish girls just kinds jiggle themselves weirdly, while we American's know how to get down properly, ha ha ha ha. (and I'm a bad dancer for home, so this was great.)

We got about 3 hours sleep that night then made our way back to Taupo and saw the exact same things that we saw the day before... oooh well. It gave us time to sleep.

Invercargil

Tonight I am staying in a hostel in Invercargil. I started today in the rain again and stayed inside as much as possible. We had a busy morning as we were planning to leave at 12 to go to Balclutha. I made a few more journals while Diana and Keith went to cover the veggie garden from the frost that was supposed to be coming. We then had a lunch of samosas, last night's tea (which happened to be tea again today) and were soon on our way out of the Catlins. I was sad to be leaving but I seriously can not wait for Laurie to come tomorrow! In town we had to run some errands and soon it was 2:15 and they were on their way up to Dunedin leaving me behind to catch my bus. We were in a small cafe so I stayed there until 4 when they closed and I waited in the i-site until 4:35 when my bus came. The ride here was a pretty long and slow 2 hours, but I am now here and my bed is paid for and made. I have called ahead for a taxi to come at 6:45 a.m. tomorrow (UGH!) and I'll catch my plane at 7:30. It takes about 2 hours to get back up to Wellington, and Coco will be waiting there when I arrive a bit after her. AMAZING things are in store for us in the coming days, so I think I'll leave it here for now.

Snowflakes falling...

It's still snowy outside and I am painting again today. We had a bit of a shock yesterday morning that I forgot to mention before. Diana has arranged with a family for them to stay in a rental house near by and has been talking with them for awhile. Chris and Luisa will come with their 2 children in a few weeks to stay for 6 months. Just yesterday morning Diana realized that she received a picture of the family in a previous e-mail so she opened it and when I came out of the shower she looked quite pale and confused. When I went over she had the picture opened and explained to me that she hadn't realized that Chris was a Christina and that the Spanish were a lesbian couple. It was quite funny I thought but she was unsure how the town would react to them coming here. It is quite conservative here and since its a rural farming town they are strange out here. The people would be very nice and welcoming to the children but the parents both being mothers would be confusing to most as they would have never thought about this type of family. It has been the talk of the small neighborhood and it is laughable how many times Diana has told the story to people.

Obama?

Today I woke up early to hear if the Presidential elections have been decided or any news about it. I turned the radio on about 7 then was woken by Diana who told me to look outside. I checked out the window and it was snowing! It was surprising for snow because in the Catlins, November is spring, close to summer even. I stayed in bed for awhile since it was warm, and listened to the radio, nothing was going on. Once I got up I watched the snow get heavier and heavier and soon it turned to hail. We were making journals today, and I thought that meant that I would be writing things, which I am horrible at, so I was nervous. It turned out that these journals were vintage books turned into bound blank journals that Diana sells in posh stores in Wellington, Auckland and a few other cities. She goes to book sales and picks up hard cover books with jackets for around $0.50 and brings them home and cuts the bindings off. She then selects a few exciting pages, maybe 5 and takes them out as well. Then the jacket's are cut to size and the front cover along with the inner sleeves are kept to glue back on. I was gluing so I had to make sure that the front picture fit properly, then placed the inner sleeves inside the hard cover. These hard covers are sent off with the inner pages to scatter within new recycled pages and are bound by a man in Balclutha. It is about $7 per book total and Diana adds $10 to each selling the books for $17 to vintage-y stores. They then sell for up to $40 which I thought was crazy! But people can not get enough and she is making new books all the time. The snow worsened as we worked and a neighbor, Carol, stopped by however she was stuck in the hail and needed to seek shelter under a bush along her walk. We took a lunch break and I soon got back to work. In the afternoon Diana and I walked up the road a bit and went to cut down flax. We took the leaves and I cut them up and used them to weave a basket. It was a little difficult to get it perfect, but I think I did a good job of it. Hopefully they will allow me to take it back into the states.

Oh and I have figured out, I think, what is wrong with my ear. The rest of my body is once again covered in bug bites and I itch all over, but my right ear had small bites along the top. They are really little but you can see the bumps and my whole ear is inflamed because of this. It's really annoying and I do not like being bitten, but I guess that is just to be expected when you are out in the wilderness.

We were listening to the radio and soon enough they announced that Obama was leading enough to call him a winner. We quickly went over to Mabel's house to watch the news and saw Obama's winning speech! I was truly hoping that he would win, not just to have a nice change, but because the area I am currently in would have had a fit if he did not. I liked being in a different country for the elections because it has given me a different perspective on the USA. 

Tea tonight was delicious, Keith made falafel which was wonderful and Diana made fresh tubule from things in the garden. We ate that over bread with lettuce and it was a great meal. I am starting to get used to having fresh foods from a garden and really want to have a garden of my own when I get home. Too bad it will be winter when I arrive. Next summer I will start a veggie garden so that I can make salads and things for myself. 

They are almost self sufficient here, as you may have guessed. Keith works 1.5 days a week teaching and Diana is a writer who has written enough in the past to not need to write more unless she wants to. The journals that I helped with today do not take a profit as Diana takes the money that she gains from selling them and invests in others through www.kiva.com which loans small amounts of money to people in third world countries so that they can start their own businesses. They live very simply without a television or much for internet and heat the house and water supply with the wood stove. They do not have an oven or cook top but instead cook either over the fire of with a hot plate or electric pan which I never knew existed. It has been really neat to get to experience life like this, I would never be able to see this side of the world from home.

Catlins again

This morning I woke up to an empty house and a list of things to get painted. Soon Diana and Keith returned, before I had started, and they explained that Mable was feeling ill this morning so they went over to make sure that she was all right. I started painting the cabin first, with a red jump suit on, and soon finished the two large sides and headed back to the house. I was going to finish the other sides but Diana said that was okay and I had a small snack of cashmerey-naan, which is sweet bread baked with coconut, coconut milk, banana's, apricots and cinnamon on top. It was delicious, we made it last night for a late night snack after dinner.  After that I started to paint a few directors chairs, two needed a primer and a color coat, and the other just a second color. I had finished painting the primer on, which they call the undercoat, and I was called in for lunch. When I went back to paint the color on, it started to rain so I only did two of the three chairs. It's pouring now so I do not think that I will be doing any more work today. Later, maybe after tea, we may head down to the donkey's paddock and bring them to the closer plot of land where they usually are, but that is all. When I got up this morning I noticed that my ears were itchy, meaning my ear ring holes were most likely infected, so I took the 2nd holes out but my left ear is really puffy and it hurts when I pull on it. I am not sure why, but the top is thicker than normal and I would really like it if it fixed itself.

Tramping

Today we started the day kind of late and went for a 2 hour tramp along a really beautiful area in the Catlins. At 10:30 we took a ride about 4 km away to the start of a road that went up into the hills along many farms. We walked up that road and along with the sheep for quite a while, 1 1/2 hours or so, then made our way to the top and got a great view of the whole valley. From there we walked down to the ocean and beach and walked on the beach for probably less than 30 minutes. We had to ford the river that we came to and it was cold and up past me knee's! I was numb from the cold after a short while and although the river was only about 30 yards wide it took awhile to cross. After that I kept my shoes off and walked back along the rest of the beach. It took just about 2 hours to go the whole way and I am not sure how much ground we covered, but I got some great pictures and surprisingly didn't get tired until the very end when the water woke me back up.

Now we are off to the Donkey's far paddock with a load of cut down trees. Hopefully they will not run away from me like they did yesterday when we went poo collecting. They didn't even let me get close enough to pet them. We have to load all of the cut tree's and branches that Keith has been cutting onto the trailer, then bring them to the paddock where there is a massive pile that will be turned into a bonfire mid-summer.

Dunedin re-cap

I just left Dunedin yesterday and I had a blast there. When I arrived Ashleigh had to take an exam that afternoon, so we went into town for lunch, then she went back to study while I explored some more. When I returned to her house she was still studying so I relaxed and soon she went to take her test. After dinner we went out to this great lookout area and I could see all of Dunedin including all of the stars. It was a great way to end the evening. The next morning we decided that we wanted to go out for the day and we planned a trip to the CADBURY FACTORY! It was Halloween that day and it was really fun to get to the factory because every time we stopped I got to fill my bag with more candy, trick or treat style! That night was Halloween so we went shopping for costumes after we returned and we both pulled together some great things. Going into the $2 store was our best bet, so we headed off in that direction and I bought an apron and Ashleigh got a construction neon yellow vest. We went to the toy store next where we found a tool belt for Ashleigh and a spatula for me. The costumes were almost complete and once we added the final touches of a workers helmet from the attic and a hair net from the Cadbury tour we were ready to go.

After the wonderfully yummy smelling factory and costume shopping, we went over to Baldwin street, which is the steepest street in the world! I climbed up the stairs along the side of the road and man was it steep! It was not any steeper than most stairs cases in Wellington, but for a road it was incredible. After walking down the hill again we got to the bottom and Ash pointed out that there were certificates that you could buy saying that you walked up Baldwin street, which I thought was ridiculously funny. (There were many azn's doing solo-peace-sign-pictures and I am sure that they bought certificates because that's that they do.) Walking back was great, but long, as we walked through the botanical gardens and covered what felt like half of the city. We then ate dinner and started to dress up! We went first to a party at a near by flat where we found the news 4 anchor team (from Anchorman) including Veronica, an ewok (or however you spell it), Alice from Wonderland, Ace Ventura and several other colorful characters. It was a great time meeting everyone and one guy's mother was there as well. She was dressed up as an "Ice Queen" which consisted of her in a skirt and top wearing a tin foil crown and wand. I ended up meeting someone from my school who I had only known by reputation, which was hysterical, and we were soon off to Mars Bar to play laser tag and mini golf. On the way to the bar we encountered a group of Kiwi's and they dumped beer on Noah. He was extremely drunk so he reciprocated by going to punch the kid, which started a whole street brawl. This was a little tricky to break up since most of the party was wasted and the few who weren't were female, but after about 20 minutes of talking we dragged the boys away and off to the bar we were. The laser tag was great fun, it was two stories, and mini golf was a good time as well. I saw a few people that I had met during orientation, but soon Ashleigh and I were getting sleepy and the crowd was moving on to the next party, so we split off. 

On my final day in Dunedin I was alone since Ashleigh had to catch a flight and left at 11:30 am. I decided to take the bus out to the peninsula since I was told that there was a penguin and albatross colony there. I soon realized that the bus didn't go out far enough and that it would have been an extra 11 km to get to see anything but some random birds. So I sat on a bench for an hour then took the bus back again. This worked out alright, but I was quite disappointed that even the closest thing, the Aquarium, was 2 km away. None the less it was pretty and I got to take a few pictures of the area. I was soon back in Dunedin and needed to get my own shuttle. Overall it was a great Halloween weekend! I loved Dunedin and I am very glad that I had a tour guide to show me about!

I am now at my new home for the week the Olsen's. I am wwoofing with them in the Catlins, which is a beautiful area. I am not sure what all I will be doing for work, but I am sure that it will involve the garden. They have a lovely small home which reminds me of my camp out on Lake Winnipesaukee, I am staying in their son's old bedroom and I have a great lookout over the ocean. They are close to the ocean and behind the house on the other side are tons of trails going into the rain forest. I can not wait to explore the area with their help. Last night I met Mable, who is their 91 year old neighbor which they watch Midsomer Murder with every Saturday night. We had a delicious vegetarian meal of spinach, potatoes, chick peas and a bunch of flavouring. I will have to get used to not eating meat, but I do not think that will be very difficult, especially for just one week. I have to get going to work now, but will soon have many more stories to tell I am sure!